Tractatus Logico-Theologicus

Transcription

3rd revised edition
ISBN 3-932829-80-8
ISSN 1436-0292
Verlag für Kultur und Wissenschaft
(Culture and Science Publ.)
Dr. Thomas Schirrmacher
TRACTATUS LOGICO - THEOLOGICUS
VKW Theologisches Lehr- und Studienmaterial 11
Paul D. Feinberg,
Professor of Biblical and Systematic Theology,
Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois
MONTGOMERY
“John Warwick Montgomery is one of the most important apologists for biblical Christianity in our time. This is his
magnum opus. In it he refutes pluralism (the view that all religions are just different ways to God and none is a
superior way of salvation) and postmodernism (the view that there is no discoverable truth that is both universal
and absolute); he then sets out the evidence validating Christianity’s truth claim. Do not go into battle without
reading this book.”
JOHN WARWICK
“The name of John Warwick Montgomery deserves to be mentioned alongside of C. S. Lewis and Francis Schaeffer
as one of the 20th century’s most articulate defenders of historic Christianity. Written in the style of the early
Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Theologicus is vintage Montgomery. It brings together and updates several decades
of his thought, as it provides a clear, articulate defense of the truth of Christianity, the existence of God, the
inerrancy of Holy Scripture, and the fundamental importance of Christian revelation for addressing the human
condition. I know of no other book like it, and given the renewed focus on religion in these troubled yet pluralistic
times, Tractatus Logico-Theologicus is must reading for anyone who wants to know how to choose a religion
intelligently.”
J. P. Moreland,
Distinguished Professor of Philosophy, Talbot School of Theology, Biola University, La Mirada, California
VKW
Professor Montgomery, a UK and US citizen, resides in England and in France. He is the author and editor of more than
fifty books in five languages (for information about his other publications, see http://www.ciltpp.com). Biographical
articles on him appear in Who‘s Who in America, Who‘s Who in France, the European Biographical Directory, Contemporary
Authors, and Who‘s Who in the World.
VKW Theologisches Lehr- und Studienmaterial 11
Professor Montgomery, while a student at Cornell University, had contact with Norman Malcolm, disciple and close
friend of Wittgenstein, and cut his teeth in formal logic under the instruction of Max Black, allegedly one of the very few
to have understood on first reading Russell and Whitehead‘s argumentation in their Principia Mathematica. Montgomery‘s
university teaching career in history, law, literature, and theology, combined with that philosophical background, led to
the production of the present work, which offers a comprehensive apologetic for classical Christianity.
Consisting of over 1,800 propositions in logical sequence, Montgomery‘s Tractatus is accompanied by detailed
scripture, name, and subject indexes. The coverage is remarkable, embracing logic, literature, history, myth, science,
philosophy, jurisprudence, political theory, and theology – interspersed throughout with the wit and rapier thrusts of a
barrister at home in adversarial contexts.
Wittgenstein‘s Tractatus, having demonstrated the limits of any non-transcendental attempt to understand the
world, ended with the proposition, “Of that which one cannot speak, one must remain silent.” Montgomery, after setting
forth in depth the overwhelming case for the very transcendental revelation for which Wittgenstein longed but never
found, concludes: “Whereof one can speak, thereof one must not be silent.”
The Tractatus Logico-Theologicus purports to break new ground apologetically, as did the Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus epistemologically. It should be of particular interest to philosophers of religion, theologians, pastors,
historians of ideas, and to everyone seeking solid answers for the ultimate questions which plague all of us at one time
or another, especially during what St John of the Cross labeled “the dark night of the soul.”
TRACTATUS
LOGICOTHEOLOGICUS
John Warwick Montgomery
TRACTATUS
LOGICO-THEOLOGICUS
Christliche Philosophie heute
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TRACTATUS
LOGICO-THEOLOGICUS
A.B. with Distinction in Philosophy, Cornell University
B.L.S., M.A., University of California at Berkeley
B.D., S.T.M., Wittenberg University
M.Phil. in Law, University of Essex, England
LL.M., LL.D., Cardiff University, Wales
Ph.D., University of Chicago
Th.D., University of Strasbourg, France
Dr. (h.c.), Institute for Religion and Law, Moscow, Russia
Christian Philosophy Today 1
Theologisches Lehr- und Studienmaterial 11
Culture and Science Publ.
Bonn 2005
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Die Deutsche Bibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche
Nationalbibliografie;detailed bibliographic data is available in the Internet at
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© 2005 by Prof. Dr Dr Dr John Warwick Montgomery,
2, rue de Rome
67000 Strasbourg
France
e-mail: [email protected]
1. Aufl. 2002, 2. überarb. Aufl. 2003, 3. überarb. Aufl. 2005
1st edition 2002, 2nd revised edition 2003, 3rd revised edition 2005
ISBN 3-938116-03-X
ISSN 1436-0292
(Theologisches Lehr- und Studienmaterial)
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For
A “ Fellowship of the Ring”—Andreae’s Civitas Christiana
Harold O. J. Brown
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INTRODUCTION
Of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Wittgenstein wrote: “Perhaps
this book will be understood only by someone who has himself already had
the thoughts that are expressed in it—or at least similar thoughts.—So it is
not a textbook.” The same may be said of the present work.
Critics will attack this Tractatus on a number of grounds. The religious
liberals, the presuppositionalists, and the pietists will dismiss it as a work
of rationalism. Theological conservatives will say that Wittgenstein was
little more than a misguided mystic and unworthy of offering methodological insights in the religious area. Many in the philosophical community
will say that a work such as this shows no recognition of the replacement
of Wittgenstein I by Wittgenstein II—the Wittgenstein of the Philosophical Investigations, who allegedly gave up all interest in verification for the
sake of linguistic analysis and the substitution of puzzles for genuine philosophical problems.
Since the present work is only structurally modeled on the Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus, much of this criticism will be beside the point. But
we note en passant that Wittgenstein himself wanted his Philosophical Investigations, if published, to appear bound together with his Tractatus:
surely indicating that he did not intend his language games to float free of
all relationship with the world, much less of verification. G. A. Smith has
quite properly shown that Wittgenstein’s later philosophy of language creates legitimate scepticism concerning “the presumption that rational, logical thinking is always or ultimately a deductive mental process. But this
is not to cast doubt on the possibility of rational, logical thinking.”1And to
those in philosophy and in religion who regard verification as unimportant,
we point out the obvious: either they think that all mutually contradictory
positions are somehow true; or they are unconcerned with the effects of
metaphysical error on individual and societal life. One would think that the
events of 11 September 2001 would have put paid to such indifferentism.
The author, though an undergraduate majoring in philosophy and the
classics at Cornell University during the time Wittgenstein visited Norman
1
Gene Anne Smith, “Wittgenstein and the Sceptical Fallacy,” 3/2 Canadian J. of Law and
Jurisprudence 155 at 179-80 (July 1990); cf. C. B. Daly, “New Light on Wittgenstein,” 10 Philosophical Studies 5-49 (1960).
7
Malcolm, never had the privilege of meeting Wittgenstein. There was contact with Malcolm, who perhaps understood Wittgenstein better than any
other2; and I cut my teeth in formal logic under the instruction of Max
Black, who allegedly was one of the very few to have understood on first
reading Russell and Whitehead’s argumentation in their Principia Mathematica. But my own studies focused on philosophy of religion and my
chief mentor was Edwin A. Burtt, author of The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Science. After Cornell, I pursued graduate studies in fields
other than philosophy, having already come to appreciate that though traditional philosophy could eloquently articulate the problems, it was incapable of supplying the solutions so desperately needed by a fallen race. My
Tractatus, whose writing literally spans some thirty-five years, is designed
to combine a serious look at those problems with the only ultimately verifiable and satisfying solution.
It should not be inappropriate, therefore, to commandeer the final paragraph of Wittgenstein’s Preface to his Tractatus—with the change of a single word: “. . . the truth of the thoughts that are here set forth seems to me
unassailable and definitive. I therefore believe myself to have found, on all
essential points, the final solution of the problems. And if I am not mistaken in this belief, then the . . . thing in which the value of this work consists is that it shows how much is achieved when these problems are
solved.”
London, England
J. W. M.
Easter Day, A.D. 2002
2
“In 1949, when Wittgenstein visited Malcolm at Cornell and sat in on one of his seminars, a
student asked who the old guy was at the back—‘impersonating Malcolm’” (David Edmonds
and John Eidinow, Wittgenstein’s Poker [London: Faber and Faber, 2001], p. 33; cf. pp. 202,
263).
8
Often as we walked together he would stop and exclaim “Oh, my God!,” looking at me almost
piteously, as if imploring a divine intervention in human events.
--Norman Malcolm, Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir, p. 32.
* * *
If you can accept the miracle that God became man,
then all of these difficulties are as nothing. . . . What inclines
even me to believe in Christ’s Resurrection? It is as
though I play with the thought.—If he did not rise
from the dead, then he decomposed in the grave like
any other man. He is dead and decomposed. In that case
he is a teacher like any other and can no longer help;
and once more we are orphaned and alone. And we must
content ourselves with wisdom and speculation. We are
as it were in a hell, where we can only dream, and are
as it were cut off from heaven by a roof. But if I am
to be really saved—then I need certainty—not wisdom,
dreams, speculation—and this certainty is faith. And
faith is faith in what my heart, my soul needs, not my
speculative intelligence. For it is my soul, with its
passions, as it were with its flesh and blood, that
must be saved, not my abstract mind.
--Ludwig Wittgenstein, cited in Wittgenstein:
A Religious Point of View?, ed. Norman Malcolm, pp. 13, 17.
* * *
Il y a assez de lumière pour ceux qui ne désirent que de voir, et assez d’obscurité pour ceux qui ont
une disposition contraire.
--Pascal, Pensées, No. 430.
* * *
Was sich überhaupt sagen läßt, läßt sich klar sagen.
--Wittgenstein, Preface to the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.
9
10
TABLE OF MAJOR PROPOSITIONS
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
The characteristic most fully shared by the
religions of the world is their incompatibility
with each other.
13
To determine which religious position, if any,
is worthy of credence requires serious attention
to Pilate’s question: What is truth?
23
Historical, jurisprudential, and scientific
standards of evidence offer the touchstone
for resolving the religious predicament by
establishing the truth claims of Christian
proclamation.
65
The historical validation of the Christian faith
yields an inerrant, perspicuous and
univocal written revelation.
128
The perennial dilemma of man (corporate
and personal) as to the meaning of existence
finds its resolution in Christian revelation.
158
The Christian revelation satisfies the
deepest general and particular longings
of the human heart.
183
Whereof one can speak,
thereof one must not be silent.
198
11
12
TRACTATUS LOGICO-THEOLOGICUS
TRACTATUS
LOGICO-THEOLOGICUS
1*
The characteristic most fully shared by the religions of
the world is their incompatibility with each other.
1.01
This fundamental incompatibility is at root logical, not sociological.
1.011
Indeed, sociological conflict between two religious positions
commonly rests in the logical incompatibility of their respective beliefs.
Logical incompatibility among religions applies no less to religions of the present than to religions of the past, and no less to
“higher” than to “lower” religions.
“There is in fact no subject upon which so much difference of
opinion exists, not only among the unlearned but also among
educated men; and the views entertained are so various and so
discrepant, that, while it is no doubt a possible alternative that
none of them is true, it is certainly impossible that more than
one should be so” (Cicero, De natura deorum).
1.02
1.03
1.1
The religious cacophony sounds to many ears like a harmony
for two understandable, but nonetheless inadequate, reasons:
1.11
Objectively, many students of the world’s religions (e.g., Max
Müller, Joseph Campbell) have noted the similarities in ceremonial practice among different faiths, e.g., the widespread
employment of animal sacrifices; or the institution of monasticism and the use of rosaries in both Eastern religions and Christianity.
* As in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, “the decimal numbers assigned to the individual propositions indicate the logical importance of the propositions, the stress laid on them
in my exposition. The propositions n.1, n.2, n.3, etc. are comments on proposition no. n; the propositions n. m1, n. m2, etc. are comments on proposition no. n. m; and so on.” But, as Stenius observed in reference to Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, this form of presentation has more in common
with musical compositions than with philosophical syllogisms. Let the reader be forewarned: attendance at this performance requires, above all, sensitivity of mind and clarity of heart.
13
1.111
1.112
1.113
1.1131
1.12
1.1201
1.121
1.1211
1.122
14
But common activities do not signify common causes; to assume this is to enter the sphere of post hoc, propter hoc.
In certain instances nothing more profound than direct cultural
borrowing accounts for similarity of religious practice.
Most important, ceremonial parallels are of superficial kind;
the issue is always the motivation behind and the purpose for
which the practice is employed: but here even religions similar
in practice can differ most radically.
That is to say, the question of religious unity depends not upon
practice but upon teaching, or (expressed more accurately) it
depends upon the teaching which gives the practice its meaning; but the teachings are the focal center of disharmony among
the world’s religions.
Subjectively, students of the world’s religions (one thinks of
Ninian Smart) frequently regard them as saying essentially the
same thing because they want them to say the same thing.
True, Smart speaks of “religious” or “theological” rather than
“phenomenological” grounds for legitimating the identification
of two or more contradictory beliefs as constituting worship of
the same God, but this gratuitous dualism merely begs the
question: why should a higher, “theological” level of validity
exist in the face of clear phenomenological contradiction?
The desire for religious unity, though not logically justifiable,
is eminently understandable: it is a special case of man’s fundamental concern to bring oneness out of the diversity of his
experience, or (in philosophical terms) to solve the ancient
problem of the One and the Many.
The problem of the One and the Many can indeed be solved,
but the solution will never result from ignoring genuine and irreducible differences in empirical experience; and the diversities in religious teaching constitute just such root differences.
We may wish most fervently that the world’s religions taught a
unified doctrine, but what is the case is not determined by what
we wish to be the case.
1.2
The conception of Deity-as-Ultimate-Concern (Tillich) is basic to religious belief, and can therefore serve as prime indicator of the logical disharmony among religious positions.
1.21
One can, with Hartshorne and Reese, pose five key questions
about God, viz.:
Is he eternal?
Is he temporal?
Is he conscious?
Does he know the world?
Does he include the world?
If the affirmative answers are designated respectively as
E,T,C,K, and W, then the following nine disharmonious positions, among others, can he identified:
ETCKW: the Supreme as Eternal-Temporal Consciousness,
knowing and including the world (Panentheism); represented
by Plato, Sri Jiva, Schelling, Fechner, Iqbal, Radhakrishnan,
Hartshorne.
EC: the Supreme as Eternal Consciousness, not knowing or including the world (Aristotelian Theism).
ECK: the Supreme as Eternal Consciousness, knowing but not
including the world (Classical and Biblical Theism); represented by Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, the Protestant Reformers.
E: the Supreme as the Eternal beyond consciousness and
knowledge (Mysticism, Emanationism); represented by Plotinus and by the Cabalistic tradition.
ECKW: the Supreme as Eternal Consciousness, knowing and
including the world (Classical Pantheism); represented by
Spinoza, Royce, and by the Eastern doctrine of Sankara.
ETCK: the Supreme as Eternal-Temporal Consciousness,
knowing but not including the world (Temporalistic Theism);
represented by Socinus.
ETCK(W): the Supreme as Eternal-Temporal Consciousness,
partly exclusive of the world (Limited Panentheism); represented by James, Brightman.
1.211
1.212
1.213
1.214
1.215
1.22
1.221
1.222
1.223
1.224
1.225
1.226
1.227
15
1.228
1.229
1.23
1.24
1. 25
1.251
T(C)(K): the Supreme as wholly Temporal or Emerging Consciousness; represented by Alexander.
T: the Supreme as Temporal and Nonconscious; represented by
Wieman.
Refinements of these positions offer numerous other irreconcilable possibilities, e.g., Whitehead’s belief that whereas God is
not the cosmos and does not include the cosmos, his activity is
always conditioned (though never determined) by the cosmos.
Moreover, varieties of religious skepticism (for example, the
“religio-pragmatic skepticism” of the Buddhist doctrine of
God) stand in direct opposition to all positive claims as to the
nature of Deity.
Though all of the above God-assertions may be wrong, they
cannot all be right.
To claim, therefore, that the numerous conceptions of Deity
among religious positions “really say the same thing” is to require an answer to the question: What evidence would convince
one that these positions are incompatible?
1.3
The world’s religions view the human person in fundamentally different ways:
1.31
As a psychosomatic unity, with a body destined for resurrection
at the end of the age (Christianity); as a dualism, with a body to
be cast off and a soul to be reunited with the Ultimate, as the
candle flame reunites with the sun and as drop of water re-enters the ocean from which it came (Eastern religions).
1.4
Evil is regarded differently in the different religions, and reconciliation of these differences is logically impossible:
1.41
The Zoroastrian held that both good and evil—Ahura Mazda
and Ahriman (Angra Mainyu)—existed from the beginning;
the Christian Science sect affirms that evil is an illusion of the
unenlightened mind; the Buddhist is convinced that evil
(Karma) dogs man’s steps from one reincarnation to the next.
Chinese folk religion, Taoism, and Confucianism consider
mankind basically good and not requiring redemption; Christi-
1.42
16
1.421
anity holds that every person has violated the will of God and
can only be saved by God’s grace as manifested in Jesus Christ.
“Before 1949, the education of wealthy boys and girls [in
China] began around the age of seven Most likely, the first
book they encountered was Sàn zi jing, the Three Character
Classic. They used it as generations of [American] colonial
children used their New England Primer, to learn elementary
reading skills along with the philosophy fundamental to their
culture. While Chinese children of the Ch’ing dynasty (16441912 A.D.) were poring over the first words of the Three Character Classic (‘Men at their birth are naturally good’), Englishspeaking children were reading rhymed couplets for each letter
of the alphabet, beginning with ‘A / In Adam’s fall / We sinned
all,’ a poem that appeared in countless primers published in
England and America during the eighteenth century” (R. and
M. S. Chang, Speaking of Chinese).
1.5
There are as many conflicting Ways of Salvation as there are
religions claiming to save:
1.51
Islam offers salvation to those who obey the Quranic law; Buddhism demands that one fully attenuate one’s desires; Christianity claims that through God’s Incarnation in Christ and
atoning death salvation has been made freely available to mankind.
The teaching of sola gratia seems to unite Christianity on the
one hand with the Sri-Vaishnava sect of Tengalai Hinduism
and the Japanese Buddhist sect of Pure Land (Jodo and Jodo
Shin-shu) on the other; but the similarity proves to be apparent,
not real.
In the Sri-Vaishnava sect, the Prema-bhakti “grace” experience is an “emotional, even sensuous, realisation” which is
“entirely individual and self-centred” (Sushil Kumar De); in
Christianity, Christ “died for all, that they which live should not
henceforth live unto themselves.”
“In Christianity everything goes from God to man; the two
terms apply to two entirely different personalities, the one being the creature of the other. In the Jodo and Shin doctrines a
1.511
1.5111
1.5112
17
human ascent towards the Pure Land takes place. We all become Buddha, and we are so already in a certain degree, since
Amida-Buddha is space, Time, Eternal Life” (Kanei Okamoto,
in Steinilber-Oberlin).
1.6
The goal of the human drama is conceived in mutually contradictory ways by the religions of the world:
1.61
The religions of classical antiquity viewed the world as eternal
and history as a never-ending cycle; Hinduism and Buddhism
are indifferent to the ultimate disposition of the world, since, in
any case, it is but illusion (Maya); Marxism proclaims the inevitable movement of history toward a classless, humanistically-perfect society; Christianity promises a Second Coming
of the Christ, a judgment both of nations and of individuals, and
the transformation of heaven and earth.
1.7
The basis of authority in the world’s religions differs radically:
1.71
In Eastern religions, it is inner experience; in Islam, it is Quranic law; in Judaism, it is the Old Testament; in Christianity,
it is both Testaments; among the Latter Day Saints, it is the
Book of Mormon; for the Deists, it was the Book of Nature; in
Totalitarianism, it is the voice of the Ruling Party (Orwell).
1.8
Yet as to ethics and morality, do not the religions of the world
offer a common message? Seemingly yes; in fact, no.
1. 81
The “lower” and “higher” religions have inconsistent ethical
codes, this being one of the main devices for distinguishing
“higher” from “lower” religions.
Taking the “higher” religions alone, one still encounters the
most fundamental moral divergences.
Observe the attitude toward marriage and woman in Islam as
compared with the teaching of Christianity in this regard.
In Quranic law, the wife is a chattel; she cannot divorce her
husband, but he can divorce her with but an announcement of
the fact (the Talaq); the woman has no hope of attaining Paradise; and the only feminine element in Paradise consists of the
1.82
1.821
1.8211
18
1.8212
1.83
1.831
1.832
1.8321
1.84
1.841
“Houris with large dark eyes” who give pleasure to the male inhabitants thereof.
In Christian teaching, “there is neither male nor female, for you
are all one In Jesus Christ” and husbands are to “love their
wives, even as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it.”
The common Tao or conception of goodness among the higher
religions (C. S. Lewis) is deceptive, for their morality is intimately connected with their other basic teachings, and these
have already been shown to stand in irreconcilable opposition.
Thus a common ethical principle (e.g., the Golden Rule) is not
really common at all if in one case it is employed as a means to
legalistic self-salvation (Islam) and in another it serves to show
man that he cannot perfectly fulfil God’s standards of righteousness and therefore must cast himself upon God’s mercy for
salvation (Christianity).
It is certainly true, as Frazer emphasised, that common motifs—such as the “dying God”—can be found in diverse religious traditions; but if it were the case that in one instance,
Christianity, the motif became actualised as a historical fact,
the presence of that motif in other religious contexts would not
vindicate those religious positions: it would simply say that in
those traditions there was a longing for just such a fulfilment
(C. S. Lewis; J. R. R. Tolkien; Simone Weil, Intimations of
Christianity Among the Ancient Greeks).
“Frazer’s account of the magical and religious notions of men
is unsatisfactory: it makes these notions appear as mistakes.
Was Augustine mistaken, then, when he called on God on
every page of the Confessions? (Wittgenstein, Bemerkungen
über Frazers Golden Bough).
A religion must not be viewed piecemeal—in terms of its morality alone or in terms of any other single aspect of its teaching—but as an organic whole having a leitmotif or leitmotifs
pulsating throughout.
The inconsistency of the basic leitmotif of one religion as compared with that of another is the clearest evidence of their incompatibility.
19
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1.8413
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1.84132
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1. 8414
1.84141
20
Personal salvation of the whole man through the atoning sacrifice of the personal God who willingly immersed himself in
man’s condition: this Christian leitmotif is not only absent from
the other religions of the world, past and present, but is basically repugnant to them.
In Judaism and Islam, the transcendent God cannot become
man; and the concept of a unique Son of God is idolatrous.
In Eastern religions, the world is illusion, and one attains Divinity by separating oneself from it.
“All suffering will cease when we suppress all desires” (the
third of the Buddhist Four Noble Truths).
Salvation by separation and negation is the path even in Mahayana Buddhism where it is taught that Gautama, after Enlightenment, delayed his entrance into Nirvana, thereby
providing a model for the bodhisattva or enlightened discipline, who will compassionately refuse Nirvana until others are
led into that state as well.
“Whereas Buddha ‘enters’ history to exhibit compassion and to
reveal a saving truth which is independent of history, Christ
‘enters’ history in order to accomplish and confirm by his death
and resurrection a salvation which is incomplete without such
historical involvement” (Sparks, in 13 Numen [1966]).
“It is undeniable that there is a fundamental difference between
Christianity and Buddhism. . . . Amida Buddha is more or less
in the nature of an expedient (hoben-setsu) because it is made
by the consciousness, that is, it is a creation of the mind (ishikishozo no mono)” (Yoshiro Tamura, Living Buddhism in
Japan).
In Confucianism, man is capable of the ethical without the aid
of Deity; salvation is understood in terms of moral self-attainment.
Confucius teaching was “hardly more than a pure secularism.
He had faith in man, man made for society, but he did not care
to follow him out of society, nor to present to him motives of
conduct derived from the consideration of a future state”
(James Legge).
1.8415
1.85
1.851
When in modern secular life, politics, science, psychology, or
any other sphere of activity is turned into a religion, then here
also the human being saves himself apart from any supernatural
agency.
An important collateral evidence that the religions of the world
are not actually saying the same thing is provided by the change
of terminology in the field of their study:
Previously the field was termed “Comparative Religion”; now
it is generally called “Comparative Religions.”
1.9
True, religions do have something in common, or the generic
term would not exist; but the closer one approaches an inarguable common denominator, the closer one comes to pure
formality.
1.91
The inadequacy of definitions of religion involving substantive
content is easily seen, and the obvious failings of any single one
doubtless explain the plethora of them.
“Religion is the recognition of all duties as divine commands”
(Kant): but a Divinity of what nature? Personal or impersonal?
Multiple or single? Separate from oneself or identified with
oneself? Ontological, metaphorical, or esthetic?
“Religion is what a man does with his solitude” (James ): And
in how many inconsistent ways do men utilise their solitude?
When one enlarges the definition to include man’s corporate
activity, the contrasts in religions becomes even more patent.
“The essence of religion is the feeling of absolute dependence”
(Schleiermacher): Dependence on what?
“The heart of religion lies in a “conjunctio oppositorum” (Jung;
Eliade; Altizer): but what specifically are the elements in opposition? (ontological good and evil, as in Christianity? the Yin
and the Yang as in Eastern thought? classes struggling for control of the means of production, as in Marxism?); and, even
more important, what is the precise nature of the conjunction?
(does it require Divine atonement, or does it view atonement as
utterly foreign to an experiential union conceived in mystical or
anthropocentric terms?).
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As soon as the key element in the definition (“divinity,” “dependence,” “conjunction”) is itself particularised, the multitude
of inconsistent particularisations destroys the concept of a single world religion.
Here lies the beauty of Tillich’s definition of religion as relation to an ultimate concern:
Allowing for all possible “concerns” (religious values), this
definition seeks maximum formality and maximum applicability.
The success of Tillich’s definition lies in its high degree of formality, or (which is the same thing) its lack of substantive content, or (again) its minimal defining character; from which we
may conclude:
As soon as one endeavors to define a common religion in which
all religions participate, one must offer a definition in more and
more general terms, owing to the substantive inconsistencies
among the teachings of the world’s religions.
Thus the wide acceptance of Rudolf Otto’s description of the
Holy: the mysterium tremendum et fascinans.
The best definition of religion will therefore be the one which
says the least.
This is so because the definiendum (religion) lacks substantive
character, or, to put it another way,
Religion does not exist, but religions do.
Any effort, therefore, to create an “ecumenical religion”
through eclecticism or syncretism (Bahaism; Toynbee) will
both pervert the religions incorporated into it (since only part
of their substantive content is employed) and yield inconsequential platitudes (as maximum generality is attained).
The logical impossibility of a world religion embracing the
world’s religions rests upon the de facto character of the religions themselves; to illustrate in terms of the Christian faith:
“Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no
man comes unto the Father, but by me.”
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“Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other
name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be
saved.”
Expressed logically, if J represents the proposition that Jesus
Christ is the sole source of human salvation, then it cannot be
the case that both J and ~J are true.
2
To determine which religious position, if any, is worthy
of credence requires serious attention to Pilate’s question: What is truth?
2.1
But the answers generally given to this question are not really
answers at all, for they beg the question.
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Many claim that “common sense” and “intuition” supply selfevident answers to the religious quest.
Common sense, however, has proved time and again to be anything but sensible, as Copernicus well illustrated; and in the religious realm, common sense is appealed to by advocates of
innumerable mutually incompatible faiths, and is thus not
“common” at all.
Intuition has led women to buy hats that do not fit them and religionists to accept tenets that stand in irreconcilable conflict
with the beliefs of other intuitionists.
Were common sense and intuition indeed sources of self-evident religious truth, it is self-evident that all men would hold
the same religious convictions.
“Authority” is said to offer the answer to the religious truthquestion.
Since “the sense of the world must lie outside the world,” an
authoritative Word of God is a desperate necessity; but where
is that Word to be found?
Merely to claim that divine authority rests with an institution
(e.g., the Roman Church), a sacred book (the Qur’an, the Bible,
the Book of Mormon, etc.), or a person (Jesus Christ, the Buddha, Muhammad, Father Divine) is not to establish that authority.
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The incompatible claims of alleged religious authorities suggests that many false prophets have gone out into the world; to
determine which prophets are false—and whether any are
true—requires a screening of authority-claims from without.
Those who claim that religious authority is self-attesting ought
to meditate on the French story of the theatre fire in which, just
as panic was about to begin, a man of distinguished, aristocratic
bearing gained the stage, raised his hand and cried, “Que chacun regagne sa place.” The audience did so and was burned to
death, whilst the gentlemen walked out through the wings, took
someone else’s cab, and drove home unharmed.
God is to be found, we are told, “where the action is” (i.e., he
is to be discovered intuitively in the social advances of our
day), and we are sensitized to recognize him through participation in “the confessing community” (Harvey Cox).
A combination of two inadequate epistemological sources (intuition and authority) yields a double-dose of petitio principii:
How does one tell God’s action from neutral—or demonic—
action? In the Germany of the early 1930’s, the “action” centered on the rising National Socialist party; was this God-revealing action?
Which “confessing community” offers proper sensitizing to the
work of the divine Spirit? The Ku Klux Klan? The Black Muslims?
If modern religious life stands “on the threshold of a whole new
era in theology” (James McCord)—an age of the Spirit—perhaps Joachim of Floris’ “third age of the Spirit” (Altizer)—we
had better be very sure that we know how to test the spirits.
Satan, it is said, is capable of transforming himself into an
angel of light.
A “spirit of Antichrist” as well as a “spirit of Christ” has to be
taken into account by the seeker for religious truth; and a way
must be found to distinguish them.
One is reminded of “the Great Beast” (Aleister Crowley) and
Anton Lavey’s Church of Satan.
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“Religious experience” is held by many to offer a sure way to
religious truth.
However, the results of analyses of religious experience are
dictated by the religious experiences which are analyzed; and
the religious experiences analyzed, being dependent upon the
criterion of religious experience employed, are necessarily
determined by the value-system of the believer.
Thus, analyses of religious experience do not yield independent
information as to what is religiously true; they simply mirror
the prior beliefs of the investigator who chooses to regard certain experiences as “truly” religious.
At best, the argument from religious experience is therefore circular; at worst, it depends upon unrecognized presuppositions
which must be tested for soundness in some other way.
Moreover, identification of religious experience with truth
commits the naturalistic fallacy (sometimes unkindly called the
“sociologist’s fallacy”): it assumes that the “isness” of the believer’s experience constitutes an “oughtness.”
Tillich was therefore quite right when he asserted: “Insight into
the human situation destroys every theology which makes experience an independent source instead of a dependent medium
of systematic theology.”
But when Tillich (together with many Protestant theologians of
the present day) offer multiple-source solutions to the religious
truth-question (religious truth is to be found in the “Bible,
church history, history of religion and culture”), they muddle
the epistemological water even more.
Just as the combination of many weak arguments does not give
rise to a single strong argument, so the marshalling of several
unjustified religious answers does not produce a single compelling religious answer.
If A, B, and C represent multiple sources of religious truth (for
example, the Anglican reliance on “Scripture, reason, and tradition”), then one must establish a calculus to handle those situations in which A, B, and C do not say precisely the same
thing, or indeed contradict one another.
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For example, one must determine whether a combination of
two sources (A, B; B, C; A, C) always takes precedence over
the third source in case of disagreement, or whether and under
what conditions A, B, or C is to be followed even when opposed by a combination of the other two sources.
The over-simplification of this example should be noted: when
sources such as Tillich’s “history of religion and culture” are
introduced, the number of factors becomes virtually unlimited,
and a proper calculus would have to be unbelievably complex.
In multiple-source approaches to the religious truth-issue, an
implicit calculus of relations thus functions as the ultimate determinant of religious truth; but this calculus must itself be justified—and when this is recognized, the truth-question is reexposed in its original nakedness.
“Faith” is self-validating, say the fideists: one must begin with
belief, not with epistemology.
Faith, however, is a relational term, always involving an object
of belief; so we are compelled to distinguish sound from unsound objects of faith.
Even if one has “faith in faith,” the question necessarily arises:
Is “faith” a better object of belief than God, or mankind, or oneself?
There is no “magic in believing”: the magic attaches to the object of believing.
Believing per se is neither good nor bad; but beliefs can be true
or untrue, noble or demonic.
To believe fervently that a medicine bottle contains aspirin
when in fact it contains arsenic is a very dangerous practice; to
consume tablets from the bottle on the ground that faith is selfvalidating could be fatal.
The answer to the question, “Can faith validate God-talk?” (Kai
Nielsen) is thus a resounding negative; whether Deity exists
and is the proper object of faith must be determined apart from
the fact of faith.
The claim of the Protestant “New Hermeneutic” (Fuchs; Funk)
that God must always be viewed as the subject of faith and the
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believer as its object in no way avoids the epistemological issue: we must still ask, Why this particular subject of faith and
not another?
Fundamental philosophical and theological problems are seldom solved merely by the alteration of terminology.
“Credo quia absurdum,” though unfairly attributed to Tertullian, has had distinguished advocates.
Tertullian himself was really saying, “The Christian faith is almost too good to be true”; and this claim—as we shall later
see—is anything but absurd.
If I am seriously told that I should accept X because it is absurd,
I must ask: Why absurdity X rather than absurdity Y? For the
world is full of remarkable and interesting absurdities.
It is evident that a non-absurd criterion would be needed to tell
me which absurdity to make the object of my faith.
Kierkegaard objects in principle to the question, What is the
proper object of faith? For one to try to answer such a question,
he maintains, is like a lover attempting to reply to the query,
Could you love another woman?
But can we accept the idea that any religious marriage is a good
one? Particularly since the number of willing brides is so great
and their characteristics so diverse and contradictory?
The real question to be faced is not, Could you love another
woman? but Which potential bride is a virgin and which a prostitute?
Theodore Abu Qurra, bishop of Harran in Mesopotamia, provided an even better analogy in the 9th century: A wise king
(God) sent his young son who had never seen him face to face
(mankind) into a distant province accompanied by a doctor.
There he falls seriously ill. Though news is brought to the king,
before he can send instructions for the boy’s care, his enemies
in the court send many false and poisonous remedies. How is
the boy to find out the genuine message from the king?
Clearly one cannot try all the faith-options of the world in the
hope of finding one of self-authenticating quality.
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The number of currently active faith-positions, though finite, is
far too great for serial faith-trials; and since any fact of the
world could theoretically serve as an ultimate concern, the actual number of faith-orientations approaches infinity.
Moreover, in what order would one try faith-claims? If no external epistemological test is to be applied to religious options,
then the order of faith-trial would be arbitrary (alphabetical?
chronological—in order of appearance on the stage of history?
vocal, in terms of the loudness of proclamation?).
But since faith-options radically contradict each other in positive teaching, it can be assumed, as in Abu Qurra’s parable, that
some at least of these religious remedies are harmful. Without
any test for truth but the “leap of faith,” how can one avoid the
live possibility of autointoxication by metaphysical poison?
And, assuming that one does successfully extricate himself
from a false option after embracing it, how many trials of total
commitment will one be able to tolerate psychologically?
Arthur Koestler’s break with Marxism came close to destroying him as a person.
How many leaps of faith does it take before one is incapable
any longer of recognizing religious truth? Ogden Nash wrote of
the seven spiritual ages of Mrs. Marmaduke Moore; we wonder
if in this case seven could in any sense be regarded as the perfect number.
Barth demands that we accept as focal center of our faith the
self-attesting, revelatory Word of God, which differs qualitatively from, and stands in judgment over, all the religions of the
world.
Our need for a genuine message from God is undeniable, but
we are loathe to assume that Barth’s revelatory Word is such a
message merely because it or he affirms that it is.
Granting that the Christian revelation-claim contradicts other
belief-orientations in asserting that God comes to mankind
with the grace of unmerited forgiveness, does this make the
Christian claim true?
In the villages of the Middle East, at the time of an eclipse, children come out into the streets banging pots and pans to
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“frighten away the whale that is swallowing the sun” (Denis
Baly); apart from concrete evidence in its behalf, the Christian
revelation claim, however noble, could likewise be a mythical
response to a very real problem.
The best indication that there is something fundamentally
wrong with Barth’s “irrationalism” (Brand Blanshard) is that
parallel claims to self-validating truth could be and have been
made with equal force by adherents of the very religions Barth
rejects; they also are capable of asserting that because of doctrinal characteristics peculiar to their world-views, all other beliefs (including Barth’s) are the product of self-deifying
religiosity, whereas their position alone is the Word of God.
To write a “Church Dogmatics” is a legitimate endeavour, but
the prior question still remains: How is the Church and its
Dogma to be justified, over against a plurality of competing
claims to truth?
All arguments begin with presuppositions; thus, we are told by
influential orthodox Protestant theologians, Christians have
every right to start from the presupposition that God has revealed himself in Holy Scripture.
Advocates of “orthodox presuppositionalism” go on to affirm
that any attempt to justify the Christian world-view makes the
presuppositions of one’s epistemology more fundamental than
one’s Christian beliefs, thus idolatrously demeaning God.
Kant’s demonstration that all arguments begin with presuppositions is eminently sound; but from this it does not follow that
I can sensibly begin to construct a world-view from any presupposition whatever.
If the latter were the case, then, as readily as one man took to
his bosom an unjustified Christian presupposition, I could take
to mine the aprioristic belief in a cheese-impregnated Deity
with whom communion is possible through the medium of the
toasted-cheese sandwich.
Religious presuppositions must be tested for truth-value from
without; otherwise one claim has as much right to acceptance
as a claim mutually incompatible with it.
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But as soon as one begins to test religious “presuppositions” for
truth-value, these religious tenets lose absolute presuppositional value.
It is nonetheless legitimate to speak of “the presuppositions of
one’s systematic theology” (meaning the starting-points for
one’s doctrinal system) as long as one recognizes that these
“presuppositions” still require justification over against other
possible starting-points for theologizing.
The truth-testing of religious first-principles does not lower
their value or depreciate the Deity on whom they center.
To use a road map to ensure that one reaches the king’s palace
instead of a garbage dump does not give the king a status below
the road map.
What would doubtless offend the monarch is an attitude of indifference in the quest: a lack of concern to distinguish his palace from the garbage dump.
It is a simple “category mistake” (in Ryle’s sense) to make invidious comparisons of value between substantive beliefs and
the epistemological means by which those beliefs are verified;
truth-tests and religious tenets have different functions; and the
use of the former, instead of diminishing the value of the latter,
actually enhances them.
Care must be taken, therefore, not to confuse one’s startingpoint for systematic theology (e.g., the God who reveals himself in Scripture) with one’s epistemological means of
verifying that starting-point (e.g., Carnell’s employment of
Brightman’s systematic-consistency motif).
For religious ontologists (such as Tillich), a proper theological
beginning is made not in the realm of epistemology, but in the
sphere of ontology, for, it is argued, every epistemology presupposes an ontology.
That every epistemology presupposes the existence of a world
of real and alleged fact capable of epistemological investigation is quite correct: but this is tautologous.
One of the chief criteria of a proper epistemology is that it not
implicitly create a world of its own distinct from the world that
is the case.
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Rather than every epistemology presupposing a world unique
to it, having no necessary relation to the world that is, a better
case can be made for the need to test every ontology epistemologically.
Why, we ask, should one conception of Being be preferred to
another? Why should one world-scheme be acceptable and another not? Why should one religious view of what is ontologically real command more belief than another?
In sum, which religious ontology is meant when we are offered
the ontological answer? And: How do we know the given answer is true?
To start (or stop) with ontology is thus to beg the truth question
no less than when the final word is allegedly spoken by common sense, intuition, authority, activism, the Spirit, religious
experience, faith, presuppositionalism, or any combination
thereof.
2.2
The search for religious truth—as for truth of any kind—
must begin with the utilisation of the laws of deductive, formal logic.
2.21
By “formal logic” we mean the deductive method of testing inferences constructed from the law of contradiction (the constant ~ ), together with any one of the following constants: V
(disjunction), • (conjunction), ⊃ (implication).
The primitives V, •, ⊃ are relatively primitive, since they are inter-definable; the contradictory function, however, is absolutely primitive, since it cannot be defined by means of any
selection of V, •, ⊃; the law of contradiction is thus the fundament of deductive logic.
Whether Whitehead and Russell, in their Principia Mathematica, are correct that mathematics is a special case of deductive
logic, or Gödel is right, by way of his incompleteness theorem,
that one cannot derive mathematics from logic since a formal
axiomatic system only partially characterises the concepts expressed therein, the deductive affinities between logic and
mathematics are so close that we may refer to formal logic also
as mathematical logic.
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In any case, the word “logic” properly has no plural.
“Sometimes people suppose that ‘symbolic’ logic and so-called
‘classical’ or Aristotelian logic differ from each other in the
sense of being logics that are not identical with respect to their
subject matters. This, however, is completely mistaken. There
is only one subject matter of both ‘symbolic’ and ‘classical’
logic, namely, formal concepts. Aside from the use of a notation which allows for both precise expression and ease in deduction, the only difference between the ‘logics’ consists in the
more accurate and extended analyses symbolic logicians have
made of their common subject matter” (Ambrose and Lazerowitz).
To denigrate logic as “Aristotelian”—and to imply that the
Protestant Reformers, in opposing medieval Aristotelian scholasticism, depreciate formal logic because they reject Aristotle’s metaphysics—is absurd.
Aristotle was the first thinker in the West to provide a systematic classification of zoological phenomena (Historia
Animalium, etc.); should we therefore reject taxonomy as
“Aristotelian?”
Non-Western “logics” are in reality varieties of that universal
system of inference based on the law of contradiction which we
in the West designate as “classical” or “symbolic” logic.
This is true even for “Indian logic” which developed in a religious atmosphere where paradox and the conjunctio oppositorum were basic motifs: “The most interesting thing about this
[Indian] variety of logic is that in quite different circumstances
and without being influenced by the West, it developed in
many respects the same problems and reached the same solutions. Examples are the syllogism of the Tarka-Samgraha and
Mathurãnãtha’s definition of number” (Bochenski).
Hegel’s “dialectic logic,” while the necessary base for his own
metaphysic, for the Marxist interpretation of history, for all
process philosophies and theologies, and for an influential
death-of-God position (Altizer), is really no “logic” at all.
If, as Hegel supposes, truth and falsity are not sharply defined
opposites, but interfuse dialectically, and “reason is the con-
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scious certainty of being all reality,” then the necessity of
knowing everything before understanding anything would preclude the possibility of knowledge as such.
“Hegel thought that, if enough was known about a thing to distinguish it from all other things, then all its properties could be
inferred by logic. This was a mistake, and from this mistake
arose the whole imposing edifice of his system. This illustrates
an important truth, namely, that the worse your logic, the more
interesting the consequences to which it gives rise” (Russell).
Hegel was wrong to assert that logic is the same thing as metaphysics, but he was quite right in identifying his own “logic”
with his metaphysics.
Why should we commit ourselves to the primitives of formal
logic, thereby presupposing the validity of its inferential system?
Not because a “revelation” establishes or employs the laws of
logic; for without the prior acceptance of the law of contradiction we would not be able to understand what a “revelation”
was saying, much less distinguish a genuine revelation from a
pseudo-revelation.
Apart from the law of contradiction, a revelation would in principle be impossible, for “revelation” would blend with “obscuration” and mankind would remain in darkness as before.
Employment of formal logic is justified by the best of all “reasons”: sheer necessity.
To reject the law of contradiction is to destroy the possibility of
knowledge as such, since from a tautology or a contradiction
anything whatever follows.
To argue against formal logic is to employ formal logic already.
Of logic one must say what Emerson said of Brahma: “When
me they fly, I am the wings.”
In the present work we have thus been airborne on the wings of
logic since proposition 1; owing to the necessitarian character
of the flight, we saw no need to describe the craft until now.
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“Why should I be logical?” You needn’t be, if that is your preference; no police force exists to enforce the laws of logic. A
man is permitted to be as nonsensical as he wishes; all he loses
is the ability to communicate with his fellows and the possibility of discovering truth.
If, however, one’s refusal to employ the laws of logic is carried
out consistently in society, the laws of the land concerning insanity (however primitive they may be) will officially separate
the individual from the society in which he can no longer meaningfully function.
Strictly speaking, the question, “How can I know that the laws
of logic are valid?” has no meaning, since an answer to it would
require the existence and employment of a higher-level logic
(L2) to justify mathematical logic as we know it (L); L2 would
then require justification by L3, and so on. Generalizing, Ln+1
would always have to be appealed to to justify Ln –to the limit
of L∞-l needing justification by L∞. But such an infinite series,
even if it existed (and we could not know if it did), would still
stand without justification of its last term and thus without
grounding for any of its other terms.
If worlds exist in which other “logics” prevail, we cannot, qua
human beings, know their characteristics, though we might on
evidential grounds come to know of their existence.
Wittgenstein is right that “we could not say what an ‘illogical’
world would look like,” but this does not limit God to the creation of worlds in which formal logic as we know it is normative.
Deductive logic is entirely formal, i.e., it does not instruct us as
to the content of the world, but shows us how validly to interrelate the facts of the world.
To utilize logic, then, is not to commit oneself in any way religiously; it is merely to admit that one is a human being.
In another sense, however, logic does tell us something about
the world: “The propositions of logic describe the scaffolding
of the world, or rather they represent it. They have no ‘subject
matter.’ It is clear that something about the world must be indicated by the fact that certain combinations of symbols—whose
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essence involves the possession of a determinate character—
are tautologies. This contains the decisive point” (Wittgenstein).
The assertions of formal logic, like the propositions of pure
mathematics, are absolutely certain; but their certainty, rather
than stemming from an accord with the facts of the world, derives from their tautological character—from their analytical
separation from the world of fact.
To argue, then, as did the Deists of the 18th century “Enlightenment,” that one’s religious position follows from Reason
alone, is to misunderstand the character of logic.
If one’s religion did actually derive from logic alone, it would
be perfectly certain; but it would gain such certainty at the expense of losing all factual content.
Logic cannot prescribe the content of religious truth; it can only
tell you that if A is true, then it has implications B, C, D, ... N,
and that ~A, ~B, ~C, ... ~N must be rejected. But, in performing
this analytical function, logic renders an invaluable service.
Those who claim that their religion follows from logic or reason are really saying that the content of their religious beliefs
seems logical or reasonable to them; but whether their religious
views are indeed consistent with the laws of logic must be ascertained, and the content of their convictions must be examined against the facts of the world.
2.3
Deductive logic cannot pass judgment on the factual nature
of the world or on what religious claims, if any, are factually
true; but empirical method can.
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Empirical method involves:
The clear recognition and accurate statement of a problem to be
solved;
The formulation of working hypotheses which appear to explain the problem;
The determination of specific methods of investigation which
will yield reliable and pertinent data on the problem;
The accurate collection and recording of the relevant data;
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The re-checking of the facts to establish their soundness and
pertinence to the problem under investigation;
The testing of hypotheses against the data, thereby confirming
or disconfirming the hypotheses in question.
Empirical method, like deductive logic, involves certain unprovable assumptions, viz.,:
A factual world exists.
“Reality . . . does appear differently to different observers,
though this difference is not an empirical difference but concerns only our speculative attitudes, the world-views that underlie our approach to the world. The mistake which gives rise
to the dispute as to the nature of the given in sense-perception
consists in thinking that this difference is somehow an empirical difference” (J. J. Ross).
The world could be no more than a dream in the mind of God,
as Kant suggested; but, if it were, we would have no way of
knowing it and would have to operate in it exactly as we do.
Pertinent is the story of the Christian Scientist who said, after
being stuck with a pin, “I will admit this much: the illusion of
pain was as bad as I imagine pain would have been.”
Solipsism cannot be disproven as a theoretical option, but the
solipsist can be transported to Broadway and 42nd Street at the
height of the rush hour and shoved into traffic; his physical perspiration may assist him in reconsidering the question as to
whether an external world of fact exists.
Solipsism is the equivalent philosophically of psychosis medically and insanity legally: a refusal to come to terms with the
factual world; if practiced assiduously, solipsism can lead to a
dehumanized, vegetative state which may well have to be
treated by legal or medical means.
“Could not the world revealed by psychedelic drugs be the real
world, and the world as we ordinarily see it constitute unreality?” Since, in a contingent universe, anything is possible, we
cannot rule this out a priori; however:
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Which psychedelic world should be regarded as real, since
there are as many such worlds as there are drugs, trips, and
travelers?
Sobering is the consideration that, under the influence of LSD,
black handwriting can appear red.
Troubling also is the fact that a cat, given the drug, recoils in
fear from a mouse (Roger Heim).
Empirical method assumes a distinction between myself as empirical investigator (the subject) and the empirical world I am
investigating (the object).
“Bohr has emphasized the fact that the observer and his instruments must be presupposed in any investigation, so that the instruments are not part of the phenomenon described but are
used ” (Lenzen).
Neither Einsteinian relativity nor the Heisenberg indeterminacy principle destroys the subject-object distinction; indeed,
relativity and indeterminacy could not even have been discovered if Einstein and Heisenberg had lost the distinction between
themselves and what they were investigating
How sad Robert Benchley’s account of his college biology
course, where he spent the term meticulously drawing the reflection of his own eyelash as it fell across the microscopic
field.
How unfortunate also if, as has been suggested, Schiaparelli’s
Martian “canals” were in part the result of incipient cataract in
his own eye.
Honesty in investigation and in the reporting of investigative
results is held as an unproved value when empirical method is
employed.
To try to demonstrate the normative character of honesty by
empirical method would be to confuse the descriptive with the
normative.
The existence of Descartes’ “evil genius” can never be eliminated as a logical possibility; but if lying were really fundamental to the universe, how would we know it? If all Cretans are
liars, can you believe a Cretan if he tells you this?
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2. 35
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2. 351
38
Such assumptions of empirical method as the factuality of the
world, its capacity for objective investigation, and the need to
report investigative results honestly involve minimal commitment as to the nature of the world.
Empirical method is of a genuinely heuristic character; it assumes as little as possible about the world and endeavours as
much as possible to discover by investigation what the world in
fact consists of.
The hypotheses employed in empirical method are explanatory
constructs—conceptual Gestalts—whose value lies in their
ability to “fit the facts” (Toulmin).
“Theories are nets cast to catch what we call ‘the world’: to rationalize, to explain, and to master it. We endeavor to make the
mesh ever finer and finer” (Popper, Wittgenstein).
Again, theories are like boots or shoes, whose effectiveness is
determined by how well they fit the foot represented by empirical data (Ian Ramsey).
The conceptual Gestalts resulting from the employment of empirical method never achieve the status of absolute certainty,
since they are at least theoretically subject to revision in light
of more extensive or more accurate factual information.
Empirical theories approach absolute certainty as a limit, but
never reach it.
Certainty rests only with the world of fact, against which hypotheses are tested and to which they must conform, and this
certainty, like that of formal logic and empirical method, is a
necessary assumption.
Conceptual Gestalts are built up through the mutual employment of deduction, induction, and retroduction
Empirical theory-formation must not be thought of monolithically, as the product of a single type of inferential reasoning,
but as “a concrescence, a growing together of variable, interacting, mutually reinforcing factors contributing to a development
organic in character” (Max Black).
By deduction we refer to the operations justified by formal,
mathematical logic.
2.352
The generalization “All P are Q” is made on inductive grounds
when the evidence for it consists of a number of propositions of
the form “This P is Q.” But how is the legitimacy of this procedure to be established?
2.3521
Not on the ground of the alleged “uniformity of nature.”
2. 35211 The claim that nature is uniform is not a logical truth, for its denial is not self-contradictory.
2.35212 But to try to establish the uniformity of nature by empirical evidence of regularities (as did J.S. Mill) is to engage in circular
reasoning.
2.352l3 “The overwhelming objection to the assimilation of all induction to deduction is that this would require that one should reasonably believe a very general empirical major premiss [the
uniformity of nature], the reasonableness of belief in which
would have to be justified by another inductive argument”
(Braithwaite).
2.35214 The principle of the uniformity of nature is thus a metaphysical
assumption—and a very dangerous one, since, far from being
heuristic in character, it commits one to a restricted world-view
in which all events must conform to regular patterns, and
unique occurrences are excluded ex hypothesi.
2.3522
Induction cannot be justified, à la Peirce, on the ground that its
self- correcting character gives it pragmatic success.
2.35221 If ultimate success through self-correction is needed to justify
induction, we shall never have it, since ultimate success “can
only mean when the need for any inference has passed, because
there is nothing left to infer to. A promissory note isn’t any
good if you cannot ever collect it” (E.H. Madden).
2.35222 Moreover, if inductive success is our ground for accepting inductive method, then we are justifying induction inductively—
and again begging the question.
2.3523
In general terms, all pragmatic arguments in behalf of induction
are inadequate because pragmatic epistemology is inadequate.
2.35231 The concept of “usefulness,” which is fundamental to all pragmatism, is impossibly vague; useful to whom and in what
sense? What utility exists in the fact that Sophroniscus was the
39
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2. 3524
2.3525
40
father of Socrates? And even if social utility is established for
such a fact, does consensus gentium ever necessarily determine
what is true?
Instrumentalism regards truth as continually subject to change
on utilitarian grounds; but, if this were the case, then the “truth”
of instrumentalism itself would remain in question. The pragmatist tacitly assumes that in the midst of a totally relativistic
universe, her own methodology is unchanging; her truth-test
thus stands revealed as self- contradictory.
True ideas often appear hopelessly impractical, and untrue
ideas may lead to results which appear to be practical; as a religious illustration, it has been observed that “Christian Science
and Roman Catholicism are both systems of belief that have led
to practical results; yet both cannot be true at the same time unless the universe is a mad house. Pragmatism may include the
untrue or exclude the true” (Brightman).
Whitehead underscores the impracticality of pragmatic epistemologies in the search for religious truth: “We want an assurance that the soul in reaching out to the unseen world is not
following an illusion. We want security that faith, and worship,
and above all love, directed towards the environment of the
spirit are not spent in vain. It is not sufficient to be told that it
is good for us to believe this, that it will make better men and
women of us. We do not want a religion that deceives us for our
own good.”
Since pragmatism supplies neither a necessary nor a sufficient
test for truth, its own claims must be checked for truth-value on
extra-pragmatic grounds; it is thus in no position to judge the
adequacy of inductive methodology.
To hold, with many “ordinary language” philosophers, that induction is justified by definition—that “the use of the term is
learned by taking note of the kind of thing which is evidence for
that term’s exemplification” (Max Black)—is too weak to be
helpful, for the marshalling of synonyms for an activity does
not constitute a valid reason for the soundness of the activity.
Induction is properly justified as is deduction: by its necessitarian character.
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2.35253
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2.3531
2.3532
2.3533
2. 36
2.361
Consider the question: What would be a sound reason for believing an oracle rather than induction? Answer: the past history of the oracle’s predictions, or evidence that the oracle is
the mouthpiece of God. But, in either case, relevant empirical
data have to be collected and analysed; i.e., inductive procedure
has to be employed.
Or take the problem: How can inductive method be disproved?
Answer: by collecting relevant data against it; but, here again,
induction is already being utilized.
It follows that “a reasoned policy for purposes of prediction and
generalization is necessarily equivalent to an inductive policy.
If we wish to call reasoned policies better than not-reasoned
ones, it follows further that induction is of necessity the best
way” (G.H. von Wright).
Retroduction (Peirce’s abduction, based on Aristotle’s
apagôgê-type inference) is the connecting link between induction and deduction.
“Abduction consists in studying facts and devising a theory to
explain them. Deduction proves that something must be; Induction shows that something actually is operative; Abduction
merely suggests that something may be” (Peirce).
“Theories provide patterns within which data appear intelligible. Theories put phenomena into systems. They are built up ‘in
reverse’ – retroductively. A theory is a cluster of conclusions in
search of a premise” (N. R. Hanson).
The employment of retroductive inference necessitates the use
of imagination, a quality vital to success in any empirical endeavor, as Einstein emphasized.
Conceptual Gestalts—the interpretive patterns created imaginatively to render phenomena intelligible—are genuinely empirical, though not in precisely the same sense as the
phenomena comprising them are empirical.
Empirical facts comprise the phenomenal content of interpretive theories, and those theories are properly confirmed or disconfirmed by the marshalling of relevant empirical data.
41
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2.363
2.364
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2.3721
42
At the same time, empirical hypotheses render empirical phenomena intelligible, and thus accomplish a task which the data
themselves do not.
Conceptual Gestalts can best be thought of as empirical propositions of the second degree (E2), made up of, and dependent
for their truth-value on, empirical phenomena (E).
Higher level interpretive Gestalts (E3, E4, ... En) are characteristic of empirical method also; but no matter how ethereally
these conceptual towers seem to rise out of the mist of the
world, their strength depends squarely on the empirical facts
which ground them and which they endeavour to explain.
An understanding of conceptual Gestalts assists in appreciating
the fundamental principle that facts are self-interpreting.
Were facts not self-interpreting, knowledge would be impossible, for the understanding of any given fact would require the
understanding of another fact or facts, leading to infinite regress and the inability to explain the initial fact concerned.
If a fact or text is held not to have any inherent meaning, so that
one must appeal beyond it to the interpreter for its true signification, then that must be true also for the extrinsic facts to
which one appeals.
“Bigger bugs have littler bugs upon their backs to bite ‘em /
And littler bugs have littler bugs / And so—ad infinitum.”
Historians must regard facts as self-interpreting.
“Let us consider an example from recent history. It can be substantiated that some 6 million Jews died under German rule in
the second World War. Let me suggest two mutually exclusive
interpretations. First, these events may be interpreted as the actions of a mad man who was insanely anti-Semitic. The deaths
were murders, atrocities. Second, it might be asserted that Hitler really loved the Jews. He had a deep and abiding belief in
heaven and life after death. After reviewing Jewish history,
Hitler decided that the Jews had been persecuted enough, and
because of his love for them he was seeking to help them enter
eternal blessedness. If no necessity exists between events and
interpretation, then there is no way of determining which meaning is correct. We would never be justified in claiming that one
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2.374
2.375
2.3751
2.376
2.377
holding the latter view is wrong. This is both repugnant and absurd. There must he an empirical necessity that unites an event
or fact with its correct interpretation” (Paul Feinberg).
Likewise, in courts of law:
“Petitioners, long time residents of North Carolina, came to
Nevada, where they stayed in an auto-court for transients, filed
suits for divorce as soon as the Nevada law permitted, married
one another as soon as the divorces were obtained, and
promptly returned to North Carolina to live. It cannot reasonably be claimed that one set of inferences rather than another regarding the acquisition by petitioners of new domicils in
Nevada could be drawn from the circumstances attending their
Nevada divorces” (Williams v North Carolina, 325 U.S. 226).
The declaration that facts are self-interpreting means that, to
understand a given fact, one must ask: “Which conceptual Gestalt best explains it?,” and then allow the fact itself to judge
among the competing Gestalts.
Suppose we have n-theories as to the nature of electrons, or as
to the meaning of a play by Shakespeare, or as to who committed the crime for which the defendant is charged, or as to what
happened to the body of Christ following his crucifixion: we
must see which theory accounts best for all aspects of the object
of our investigation.
Where such a process is carried out, the object of the investigation ultimately decides among the interpretations of it, and so
we may say that the object is self-interpreting.
Ian Ramsey, following Wittgenstein, employs the analogy of
the shoe and the foot to illustrate this point: the world of fact is
like a foot and our interpretations of it like a shoe; what we seek
is the ideal interpretation which will be neither too narrow
(pinching the foot) nor too broad (fitting any foot and therefore
not helpful in the particular case).
Questions of fact and questions as to the meaning of texts (scientific, legal, literary) can indeed be said to have “one right answer” (Ronald Dworkin)—in the sense that one Gestalt will
better fit the subject of the investigation than will its competitors.
43
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44
The very possibility of arriving at knowledge of the world requires the assumption that a relation of agreement, fit, or correspondence exists between true assertions about the world and
the nature of the world as it actually is.
Two varieties of the correspondence theory of truth can be distinguished, viz.:
Correspondence-as-correlation, where correspondence is a
“weak” relation, a pairing of two groups in accordance with
some principle; and
Correspondence-as-congruity, where correspondence is a
“strong” relation of harmony between language and the world.
The “weak” correlation theory has been regarded as superior to
the “strong” theory because it supposedly does not involve a
denotative theory of meaning (“a term means whatever it denotes”); however, correspondences-as-correlation employs an
implicit denotative meaning theory and requires a strong congruity relation between language and the world for its own acceptance.
When Austin declares that “a statement is said to be true when
the historic state of affairs to which it is correlated by the demonstrative conventions (the one to which it ‘refers’) is of a
type with which the sentence used in making it is correlated by
the descriptive conventions,” he must assume that the “conventions” involved do in fact accord precisely with the real world
and that the terms conventionally employed accord precisely in
meaning with the states of affairs to which they refer.
The most thorough statement of the “strong” view of truths-ascorrespondence remains that of Wittgenstein, who asserted that
elementary propositions (those to which all others are reducible
by analysis) are logically perfect pictures of the states of affairs
they describe, and that “in order to tell whether a picture is true
or false we must compare it with reality.”
Unlike Russell, Wittgenstein made no attempt to create an ideal
symbolic language, for he saw that logically there must already
be a congruence between language and reality; for the same
reason he was not inclined to construct a common scientific
language as were the members of the Vienna Circle.
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2.3823l
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2.3831
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2.3832
In contradistinction to Russell and logical positivists such as
Carnap, Wittgenstein rejected the concept of a hierarchy of languages, each of which serves as a metalanguage for describing
a language lower on the scale; he was aware that at the upper
end of the continuum this concept involves infinite regress, and
at the lower end the recognition of his own basic principle that,
on the most fundamental level, language must picture facts and
cannot at the same time picture its own picturing of facts.
Moreover, Wittgenstein avoided Carnap’s linguistic “tolerance
principle,” whereby the latter asserted that “in logic there are
no morals. Everyone is at liberty to build up his own logic, i.e.
his own form of language, as he wishes.”
“Carnap’s tolerance-principle must lead to absurdities” (Hartnack). “In the tolerance here I can see nothing but an expression
of weakness and resignation. That kind of liberalism is misguided” (G.H. von Wright).
Arguments against the correspondence view of truth leave it
untouched.
We are told that for Wittgenstein’s “strong” correspondence
theory to succeed, it would be necessary to be able to specify
the actual number of constituents a proposition has and to show
how each element can be paired with reality; moreover, Wittgenstein would have to produce examples of elementary propositions, and of the simple objects which are denoted by the
terms (names) comprising the elementary propositions.
Wittgenstein was indifferent to the empirical identification of
simples and to the linguistic analysis of propositional assertions because he realized that correspondence between language and the world is not established by empirical research or
by the work of linguists, but has to be assumed on the grounds
of logical necessity if we are to know anything about the world,
and is in fact presupposed in all our attempts to understand the
world.
Even Wittgenstein’s own second thoughts on the denotative
theory of meaning and his expansion of linguistic interest via
language games did not, pace many of his interpreters, cause
him to reject a correspondence view of truth.
45
2.38321
“Wittgenstein’s later philosophy is a plea for the return to earth,
to facts. It cannot be too much emphasised that the return to ordinary language is a return to reality, to facts. It is the means to
getting the ‘engine’ of thought back in motion again; making
the disconnected wheel ‘engage’ again with the rest of the machinery of experience; getting ourselves ‘off the slippery ice’,
where the conditions looked ideal ‘but where also, just because
of that, we are unable to walk’, and ‘back to the rough ground’
where we have the indispensable ‘friction’ of hard fact” (C.B.
Daly, citing the Philosophical Investigations).
2.38322 Though not a few practitioners of ordinary language philosophy and theology (in the latter category: William Hordern) are
indifferent to the grounding of language games in reality by
way of a correspondence relation between the world of the
game and the world of fact, Wittgenstein never suffered from
such indifference.
2.383221 “The argument that meaning is not a matter of a private mental
act, but rather of the function or use of language in the context
of established community practice is not an argument for scepticism of the possibility of objectively correct understandings
or interpretations, it is an argument against that scepticism. Because there is no meaning to one’s words apart from the function they perform, the language game one is playing, meaning
cannot be an unattainable something locked up in a person’s
mind. The idea that someone might always mean something
different or something more than you or I do, or than she might
be able to explain to us, when she describes lemons as ‘yellow,’
is incoherent, for there is nothing in which that ‘something
more’ could consist. Radical subjectivity in meaning and interpretation is incoherent” (G. A. Smith).
2.383222 A language game manifesting internal inconsistency is an exceedingly poor candidate for acceptance; but the mere presence
of internal coherence hardly establishes the truth of a language
game, since many mutually incompatible language games can
be internally consistent.
2.383223 To claim for Christian theology the status of an “Olympic
game” (Hordern) which lays down standards of “purpose, di-
46
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2.38341
rection, and integrity” for other “games” (disciplines) is fatuous unless theological assertions can be shown to correspond to
reality; otherwise, why should any other discipline subject itself to theology’s standards?
Is not the correspondence understanding of truth belied by the
number of utterances that are neither descriptive nor susceptible of analysis in terms of correspondence? One thinks of performatory utterances, formulae in a calculus, definitions,
value-judgments, intentional fictions, etc.
Granted, as the ordinary language school has stressed, “it is
simply not the business of such utterances to ‘correspond to the
facts’ (and even genuine statements have other businesses besides that of so corresponding),” but this says only that such utterances are not intended to describe the world and therefore
are not properly regarded as either true or false.
A blending of the descriptive and the performatory often occurs; and when it does, the descriptive aspect, to be true, must
involve correspondence with reality: “It is common for quite
ordinary statements to have a performatory aspect: to say that
you are a cuckold may be to insult you, but it is also and at the
same time to make a statement which is true or false” (Austin).
When Sraffa made a Neopolitan gesture of contempt and asked
Wittgenstein, “What is the logical form of that?,” no refutation
of the correspondence theory was involved. If Sraffa had intended the gesture to express a personal value-judgment only,
then any attempt to determine its “truth” would have been out
of place; on the other hand, if Sraffa had employed the gesture
to say something about the world, then its truth depended
squarely on whether the view of the world conveyed by the gesture corresponded to reality.
But do not “facts” exist solely in—and are they not actually
created by—the context of the language game being played, so
that truth as correspondence with fact cannot be maintained in
any absolute sense?
The contention is correct that what is regarded as a “fact” in one
language game (e.g., poetry) may be considered not to be a fact
in another language game (e.g., science); but whenever a cog-
47
nitive language game is played—a game purporting to say
something as to what exists—the test for the soundness of its
assertions is simply whether the world does indeed have the
characteristics attributed to it.
2.384
The correspondence idea of truth can be justified in positive
terms.
2.3841
Justification does not take place on the grounds of venerability
or authority, but it is of more than passing interest to note that
the two streams of thought whose confluence forms the Western mind—classical philosophy and Hebrew-Christian religion—presuppose truth as correspondence.
2.38411 Plato evidences correspondence thinking in the Sophist, and
Aristotle in the Metaphysics. If the correspondence theory
“struck the great philosophers who first considered the problem
of truth—viz., Plato and Aristotle—as so obviously the correct
one that the question of possible alternatives to it never occurred to them” (George Pitcher), is it not just possible that this
was because no meaningful alternatives exist?
2.38412 “It really ought to go without saying that with all its different
genres and figures of speech, Scripture, like all cognitive discourse, operates under the rubrics of a correspondence idea of
truth: see John 8:46; Eph. 4:25; I Ki. 8:26; 22:16, 22 ff.; Gen.
42:16, 20; Deut. 18:22; Ps. 119:163; Dan. 2:9; Prov. 14:25;
Zech. 8:16; John 5:21-32 ff.; Acts 24:8-11; I Tim. 1:15; note,
too, the forensic picture which haunts all of Scripture—for example, such concepts as witness, testimony, judge, the Eighth
Commandment, etc.; John 21:24” (Robert Preus).
2.38413 Indeed, the Hebrew-Christian Scriptures view the correspondence between language and the world as properly a relation of
strict congruity, involving a denotative conception of meaning.
2.384131 Thus: Adam appropriately named the animals in Eden; the
names given to Old Testament persons corresponded to their
characteristics; Jesus himself was named in this fashion (Hebrew/Aramaic:“Jahweh will save”) because “he shall save people from their sins”; Simon and Saul received appropriate new
names (Peter and Paul) after they came to know Jesus as their
Lord.
48
2.3842
Logical justification for strict correspondence-as-congruity is
based on a necessitarian line of reasoning: “There must be a
completed route from words to something outside words which
they denote. But if one word only leads to others, and they in
turn only to still others, and so on forever, then words are eternally trapped in their own realm. At some point, there must be
a breakthrough” (George Pitcher, explicating Wittgenstein).
2.3843
Further evidence that truth as correspondence must serve as a
necessary assumption in evaluating propositions about the
world is supplied by the fact that even the theories of truth that
purport to replace or surpass the correspondence idea implicitly
use it.
2.38431 F. P. Ramsey maintained that the predicates “true” and “false”
do not designate either properties of propositions or relations
between propositions and something else, but are “logically superfluous”; Strawson refined this view by holding that whereas
to assert that the statement S is true says no more than the assertion S, it does serve to confirm, grant, or reinforce the assertion S.
2.384311 Agreed that “to say that I believe you is on occasion to accept
your statement; but it is also to make an assertion, which is not
made by the strictly performatory utterance ‘I accept your
statement.’ Mr. Strawson seems to confine himself to the case
where I say ‘Your statement is true’ or something similar—but
what of the case where you state that S and I say nothing but
‘look and see’ that your statement is true? I do not see how this
critical case, to which nothing analogous occurs with strictly
performatory utterances, could be made to respond to Mr.
Strawson’s treatment” (Austin).
2.38432 Brightman’s criterion of truth as “systematic consistency” involves observance of the law of contradiction (consistency or
formal truth) and “devotion to all of the facts of experience”
(systematic or material truth).
2.384321 But “consistency” simply marks allegiance to the laws of logic,
and the “systematic test”—the test pertaining to empirical facticity—requires the investigator to distinguish what is from
what is not the case in the world of experience and then bring
49
his assertions into accord (the relation of correspondence!) with
reality.
2.385
What of the oft-repeated, and presumably irrefutable, counter
to any and all correspondence views of truth that one cannot
compare the world with assertions about it: one can only compare one idea in the mind with another?
2.38501 Expressed otherwise, it is claimed that since reality is extra-idiational, one cannot bring it into the mind to compare it with the
picture by which the mind endeavours to represent it; a proper
comparison therefore can be made only among ideas.
2.3851
It is of course true that one cannot literally put the world in
one’s mind so as to be able to compare it with ideas concerning
it; the mind compares ideas with ideas.
2.3852
Correspondence views of truth assume—and must assume—
that an objective world outside of the mind in fact exists and
that the mind is capable of comprehending it.
2.3853
This, however, is an unprovable assumption made not only by
the advocate of correspondence but also by the critic, for one
cannot function in this world at all without making it.
2.38531 Were the critic not to assume such, he would be incapable of
(inter alia):
2.385311 Distinguishing his wife from a prostitute (since only his ideas
of wives and prostitutes, not the women themselves, exist in his
mind for comparison);
2.385312 Distinguishing his favourite restaurant from the municipal garbage dump (since neither exists in his mind for comparison
with his ideas of garbage and paté de foie gras).
2.3854
A refutation which depends on the rejection of a consideration
which the critic herself necessarily accepts cannot possibly be
a sound refutation.
2.38541 Such an argument is the functional equivalent of sitting on the
proverbial limb and cutting it off beneath one’s derrière.
2.38542 Or: it is the equivalent of the occultic Ouroboros, which digests
its own tail.
50
2.4
What of the influential Process schools of philosophical and
theological thought, committed to the proposition that not
“Being” but Becoming” constitutes the fundament of reality?
2.41
2.411
Is it indeed the case, universally:
That “you cannot step into the same river twice,” since not only
the river, but you personally, will not be the same on the second
occasion as on the first (Heraclitus)?
That God should be regarded, not as an Absolute, but in dynamic relation to the cosmos, either pantheistically (God and
the cosmos are coterminous); or panentheistically (God is
greater than the cosmos, but the cosmos is a part of God), as
conceived by K. C. F. Krause and reflected in the thought of
Hartshorne, Pittenger, Cobb, and Gregory Boyd; or, à la Whitehead, as One who, whilst neither identical to nor including the
cosmos, is always conditioned by it?
These views, whether philosophical or theological, refuse to
begin with, or to employ as a fundamental category, an absolute
point of reference.
But all arguments must have a starting point.
In logic, as we have seen, that point is the non-processive law
of contradiction; Hegelian dialectic “logics” in fact presuppose
that law without realising that they do so.
Process positions either make their claim from an unrecognised
acceptance of inductive method as an absolute starting point or
they absolutise the very concept of Process.
If the former, they must demonstrate, as a synthetic fact, that
flux is more fundamental than permanence and that God does
in fact change in relationship with his cosmos—tasks beyond
all human competence.
If the latter, they have the burden of showing that Process is
more fundamental than Stasis—which hardly seems likely
when any such proof would have to assume the law of contradiction as its absolute starting point.
In both scenarios, therefore, Process thinking shows itself inherently self-contradictory: flux is allegedly primary, but to ar-
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2.43
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51
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52
gue or show this, one must work from an absolute of either
deductive or inductive logic.
Not without reason, then, the major streams of philosophical
thought have followed Plato’s assertion of the primacy of Being rather than a Pre-Socratic commitment to Becoming.
Theologically, the notion that God is dependent on his creation
poses more problems than it solves.
Brightman’s “finite God” left the believer with considerable
disquiet: if God is not necessarily capable of an eventual triumph over evil, why bother to help him? Maybe one would do
better to choose the other side?
An “Openness” theology, which, in the supposed interest of
preserving freedom of human decision-making by removing
God’s omniscience, leaves God unable to prophesy with any
confidence (since, like his creatures, he is limited to statistical
prediction within the framework of his limited knowledge) and
unable to assure his followers of a positive conclusion to human history.
Such a view seems far removed from that of Jesus, who declared that “Not a sparrow shall fall on the ground without your
heavenly Father knowing it” (Matthew 10).
Moltmann’s “Theology of Hope,” grounding our theological
knowledge in the eschatological future, places religion at the
mercy of the least known aspect of life, namely, what is yet to
transpire.
It gives maximum generality to the “eschatological verification” argument (to test the truth of the Christian claim, you
must first die; you will then know whether there is eternal
life)—an argument which, not surprisingly, has led to few religious revivals.
Similar criticism can properly be directed to the views of Teilhard de Chardin, who offers an esoteric “hyperphysics,” subordinating entropic drift to organic evolution (in defiance of all
modern physical theory), thereby supposedly justifying the
promise of a progressive, evolving future where God waits for
us “up ahead” at a mystical, christic “Omega Point.”
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For religious Process views to succeed, it would appear that
their adherents require a reference point beyond the human situation in order to justify their description of God’s nature; or a
special revelation from him providing them with the knowledge that He is indeed processive.
They clearly lack the former (even were they to cry, “Stop the
world; I want to get off,” it would not stop); and the latter
would have to be an absolute, not a processive, revelation
(since otherwise it could not be depended on for its picture of
God).
Chardinian “New Shape” Roman Catholicism cannot, even in
principle, offer the needed solid revelational ground for theological Process, since within the “true Church” (as Karl Adam
stressed), revelation is organic in character; therefore, future
Magisteria will always be capable of revising prior ecclesiastical pronouncements.
Biblical revelation, over against all such views, asserts unqualifiedly that God in Christ is “the same yesterday, and today, and
for ever.”
Religiously, also, there is a most uncomfortable experiential
consequence of a Process view of Deity: it forces one, against
one’s knowledge of one’s own inadequacies and evil tendencies and those of the human race, to see, in the shaving mirrour
each morning, the Divine Presence.
“The man who denies original sin believes in the Immaculate
Conception of everybody” (G. K Chesterton).
If the world were really “within” God, or God were necessarily
conditioned by it, either God himself would be a sinner or there
would be no sin at all.
In Process theology the jettisoning of sin results necessarily in
the loss of any meaningful understanding of the need for Incarnation or for redemption.
Which doubtless accounts for the fact that in such writings of
the Process theologians as Cobb’s A Christian Natural Theology, redemption is conspicuous by its absence.
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2.5
We are told by existentialists (Heidegger, Bultmann) and
post-modernists (Derrida) that objective truth cannot be arrived at, owing to the necessary interlocking of the object of
interpretation with the interpreter, such that the investigator
of the world will always colour what he is investigating (the
so-called “Hermeneutic Circle”).
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From this it follows that, ultimately, the most that one can do is
to create values by one’s acts of decision (Sartre), or to “tell
one’s story” (Postmodernism).
Sartre (Existentialism and Human Emotions) illustrates this
with the account of a young man’s coming to him for advice
during the Second World War: should he join de Gaulle in England or not? Sartre’s answer: “There are no omens in the world,
and, if there were, we would give them their meaning. Decide!”
We are led inexorably to the conclusion that it is fruitless to go
to an existentialist for advice.
It is of course true that the observer brings to every investigation of the world her own background and prejudices.
But this is a descriptive fact, hardly a proper normative piece of
advice.
It is a mark of maturity, and a departure from childishness, to
be able to distinguish the nature of things as they actually are
from one’s own beliefs and desires.
We must not forget the case of Schiaparelli’s Martian canals, or
Robert Benchley’s college biology class.
To lose sight of the difference between one’s own story and the
story of the world outside is to turn the world’s story into a solipsistic fairy tale.
To confuse one’s own story with that of human history is to
transform history into an historical novel.
No-one, to be sure, lives such existentialism or Postmodernism
in ordinary life, or could live that way (cf. A. Sokal, Fashionable Nonsense).
We regard as autistic those who build and inhabit worlds of
their own, untouched and untouchable by outside reality.
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In jurisprudence, the Critical Legal Studies movement (Roberto Unger, Duncan Kennedy) maintain that the law is to be
viewed from the standpoint of radical scepticism: all legal
judgment is a matter of choosing one set of values over another.
It follows that, for those of this viewpoint, the purpose of legal
activity is not a search for principles of justice embedded in and
developed by the legal tradition, but the conscious advancement of a political vision.
The law, we are told, is inherently indeterminate; its literature
has no single and objective meaning, being capable of virtually
any interpretation; legal principles are contradictory; indeed,
the law is but a tool generally serving the interests of the powerful and the maintenance of the status quo.
Convinced advocates of CLS follow the approach of critical
neo-Marxist Antonio Gramsci and endeavour to destabilise the
liberal legal culture in favour of those they see as oppressed.
As in science and history, so in law, such a viewpoint will eliminate all objective determinations; guilt and innocence, right
and wrong, justice and injustice will go by the board in favour
of the “story” the CLS advocate wishes to tell or the CLS judge
wishes to implement.
One is reminded of the “show trials” of Soviet Russia, in which
innocence was sacrificed in the interests of “educating” the
populace to the needs of the Proletarian society as defined by
the Party’s “story.”
“The thought of vanguard lawyers armed with real destabilisation power conjures up nightmare visions of re-education
camps” (J. W. Harris).
If it is true, as it surely is, that “the world is the totality of facts”,
“the world is determined by the facts,” and “the totality of the
facts determines what is the case” (Wittgenstein), then we must
respect the facts and not endeavour to force them into the Procrustean bed of our personal prejudices or value system.
Only by listening, observing, and subordinating ourselves to
the facts of the world will we have any chance of understanding
it.
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There is no logical necessity for a Word of God to have appeared in this world, but to the extent that we insist on “our
story,” the chances of our finding it reduce proportionately.
J. A. Bengel’s aphorism, Te totum applica ad textum, can be
generalised, over against all forms of the Hermeneutic Circle:
Te totum applica ad mundum.
Who knows, perhaps it is indeed the case that Verbum in mundo
venit.
2.6
The psychoanalytic revolution of the 20th century (Freud, Lacan) is grounded in the conviction that the unconscious mind
determines conscious activity; does this not eliminate the possibility of successful objective investigations of the world, including the determination of religious truth?
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One need not dismiss the clear influence of the unconscious in
dreams, lapsus linguae, etc., to see the fallacy in such a conclusion.
Were we to agree that all conscious mental activity may mean
something other than what the thinker intends or believes it to
mean, and that the only way to understand true meaning is by
way of depth analysis, we would still have to ask: Is the analytical technique itself not necessarily the product of the analyst’s
unconscious, and therefore inscrutable without depth analysis?
More concretely, how did the first analyst (Freud?) transcend
the problem of really knowing his own intentions?
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
The analyst must assume that she at least can comprehend objective reality in the treatment of the patient.
But how, then, can the psychoanalytic community maintain an
embargo on objectivity and the meaningful investigation of reality by others?
In theory, it might be the case that only those with psychoanalytically attained self-knowledge are capable of objective understanding, but the burden of demonstrating this surely lies
with the psychoanalyst; this heavy burden of proof remains to
be discharged.
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When the analyst asserts, in the Freudian tradition, that religious assertions such as “A loving God exists” are the product
of human illusion, we may legitimately ask: How do you know
that your denial of his existence is not the product of your unfortunate psychological development and experiences?
All attempts at psychological reductionism are two-edged
swords, equally capable of decapitating the wielder of them.
Psychoanalytic attempts at historical explanation have been
particularly disappointing.
Erikson (and playwright Osborne, following him) “explains”
Luther’s reforming activity as the result of a severe “authority
problem,” stemming from early resentment to father and teachers; and all this on the basis of the sketchiest childhood data.
Feldman, having accounted for Benjamin Franklin’s development of the lightning rod to control thunderbolts as the product
of Franklin’s effort to handle anal-erotic drives, justifies such
an interpretation in the absence of records of Franklin’s education in rectal cleanliness: “Logic will have to supply what the
biographers miss.”
One receives the distinct impression that psychoanalytic theory, whatever its therapeutic value, operates as a closed system,
largely unwilling to subject its basic assumptions to meaningful testing, and perhaps incapable of doing so.
2.7
What of the popular view that scientific activity is really not
the product of objective, empirical investigation of the facts of
the world, but the result of the metaphysical presuppositions,
commitments, and Gestalt of the scientist (Burtt, Polanyi,
Kuhn)?
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This understanding should not be attributed to Edwin A. Burtt,
whose purpose in his classic, The Metaphysical Foundations of
Modern Science, was only to show the extent to which unexamined presuppositions can and have influenced scientific thinking (cf. R. Hooykaas’ Gifford Lectures).
Burtt’s point is entirely valid, and serves to criticise, not scientific method as such but scientism—the “religion of science”—
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which would pass off the worldview of the scientist as the
equivalent of a legitimate application of scientific method.
Examples abound, as in the case of Evolutionary Theory,
where a naïve, unverified, 19th century belief in Progress,
rather than empirical evidence, has led to the widely held conviction that amoeba-to-man evolution is indisputably scientific
(contra: A. Standen, Science Is a Sacred Cow; M. Midgley,
Science As Salvation; C. Hunter, Darwin’s God).
It is likewise unfair to attribute to Polanyi an anti-objectivist
view of scientific method.
True, Polanyi opposes a naïve, Baconian inductivism and the
belief that the scientist operates with a Lockean tabula rasa:
“Far from being neutral at heart, he [the scientist] is himself
passionately interested in the outcome of the procedure. He
must be, for otherwise he will never discover a problem at all
and certainly not advance towards its solution.”
But this does not mean that the scientific investigator can legitimately create results that are the mirror-image of his own belief system; as in proper legal procedure, he must evaluate
evidence and come to conclusions that are consistent with it: he
acts, declares Polanyi, “as detective, policeman, judge, and jury
all rolled into one. He apprehends certain clues as suspect, formulates the charge and examines the evidence both for and
against it, admitting or rejecting such parts of it as he thinks fit,
and finally pronounces judgement.”
As for the Kuhn thesis, it is simply not the case that one scientific paradigm replaces another simply because of a shift in
metaphysical orientation.
Though alterations in the ideological climate may contribute to
movements in scientific theory, the ultimate reason why one
theory replaces another is the incapability of the older theory to
explain facts which are explainable by the newer theory; here,
the “crucial experiment” is the key.
So—to take but a single example—the scientific revolution
represented by Einstein’s special theory of relativity, which reduced Newtonian physics to a special case within relativitiy
theory, was ultimately accepted when the Michelson-Morley
experiment put paid to the belief in an “ether” as a universal
medium for the transmission of electromagnetic waves.
2.8
Assuming (as we must) that truth claims are to be tested by the
twin criteria of logical soundness and empirical facticity,
what if a claim proves genuinely factual but logically problematic, i.e., suppose only the factual test is met?
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Were the reverse to be the case (a logically coherent position in
violation of the facts), we should readily reject it:
The great paranoiacs have invariably set forth consistent worldviews.
Baron Munchausen’s tales were wonderfully consistent.
But facticity cum illogic cannot be so readily dismissed, since
it is indeed the case that “life is bigger than logic."
When light is subjected to two equally sound tests to determine
its nature, they give logically conflicting results, for to be particulate and undulatory at the same time is irrational: particles
(having mass) are not waves, nor are waves particles; yet the
photon (a “wave-particle") is properly employed as the unit of
light, since to do otherwise would fly in the fact of demonstrable fact.
“Quantum physicists agree that subatomic entities are a mixture of wave properties (W), particle properties (P), and quantum properties (h). High-speed electrons, when shot through a
nickel crystal or a metallic film (as fast cathode-rays or even Brays), diffract like X-rays. In principle, the B-ray is just like the
sunlight used in a double-slit or bi-prism experiment. Diffraction is a criterion of wave-like behaviour in substances; all classical wave theory rests on this. Besides this behaviour,
however, electrons have long been thought of as electrically
charged particles. A transverse magnetic field will deflect an
electron beam and its diffraction pattern. Only particles behave
in this manner; all classical electromagnetic theory depends
upon this. To explain all the evidence electrons must he both
particulate and undulatory. An electron is a PWh” (Hanson,
Patterns of Discovery).
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In such instances, one wishes it were otherwise, and every effort is of course made to resolve the contradiction, but if it cannot be resolved, the facts nonetheless remain.
The bedrock justification for such a position is that logic is a
matter of pure formality--the “scaffolding of the world,” not the
world itself.
The content of the world can be discovered only by seeking its
factual nature; if it proves to be “illogical,” so much the worse
for our reasoning, not so much worse for the world.
2.9
A verifiability principle cannot be avoided.
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Those who argue to the contrary are employing an implicit criterion of verifiability to refute it.
Implicit operations are always more dangerous than explicit
operations, for at least the latter occur in the open epistemologically and can far more readily be evaluated.
But is it not better to speak (à la Popper) of “falsifiability” and
not of “verifiability"?
Falsification is indeed vital, for it clears the field of chimerical
players in the game of truth.
However, since there are in theory an infinite number of possible worldviews, to eliminate even a significant number of them
will never, by process of elimination, yield the true worldview
(if such there be).
Moreover, as in Popper’s own case, exclusive concentration on
falsification leads to a perpetually tentative view of the world
contradicted by the day-to-day necessity of decision-making.
“Popper’s own philosophy of science had this element of paranoia in it. Because what he used to teach us is that the nearest
thing to a true theory is one that hasn’t betrayed you yet” (Toulmin).
Even more importantly, the same criteria will inevitably apply
to verification as to falsification, so one gains little by insisting
on the latter in preference to the former.
By verification we mean: the evaluation of the potential truthvalue of a proposition by asking, “Can the one claiming it to be
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veracious offer some means of confirming its truth, i.e., can she
indicate what observations should lead us to accept the proposition as true or reject it as false?”
Here, the classification employed by the Analytical Philosophers has considerable utility: truth claims are either formal
(“analytical”) assertions, factual (“synthetic”) assertions, or assertions that are neither formal nor factual (“meaningless” or
“nonsensical” statements).
Analytical claims, the truth of which depends on their definition (e.g., assertions of formal logic, pure mathematics, and
tautologies) are verified by seeing whether or not they logically
follow from their premises.
Examples: 2 + 2 = 4; Euclidean proofs; the assertion that “All
husbands are married.”
It is a category mistake to think that any observation of the
world can verify or falsify such assertions: no sociological survey will establish whether indeed all husbands are married.
Synthetic claims, on the other hand, do make assertions about
the world, and only by factually vetting those assertions can
one determine their truth or their falsity.
Example: “There are five husbands in this room”; “Napoleon
lost the Battle of Waterloo”; Abraham Lincoln was fatally shot
in Ford’s Theatre, Washington, D.C., rather than expiring after
a slip and fall accident in Peoria, Illinois”; “Jesus claimed to be
God, predicted that he would rise from the dead, and was in fact
resurrected.”
It will be observed that verifying a factual claim does not require laboratory experiments or repeatability, as desirable as
these are where possible and appropriate.
A. J. Ayer eventually saw that historical claims could hardly be
regarded as little more than pseudo-synthetic—and therefore
meaningless—because it is very difficult to repeat the Battle of
Waterloo under laboratory conditions.
Even in the “hard” sciences, experiment and repeatability are
not always possible: think of palaeobotany (where the plants
are no longer available for laboratory work) or astronomy
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(where, owing to the speed of light, one often observes galaxies
no longer in existence and therefore immune to experiment).
Verification does not arbitrarily force data into the Procrustean
bed of a single investigative method; it does, however, insist
that where there is no way, even in principle, to confirm or disconfirm a truth claim, such a claim be classed as nonsensical or
meaningless.
Not, to be sure, meaningless in absolute terms: such claims can
be very meaningful psychologically (they can tell us much
about the claimant) or sociologically (they can likewise provide exceedingly valuable insights into the groups maintaining
such claims).
“Imagine that there is a town in which the policemen are required to obtain information from each inhabitant. e.g. his age,
where he came from, and what work he does. A record is kept
of this information and some use is made of it. Occasionally
when a policeman questions an inhabitant he discovers that the
latter does not do any work. The policeman enters this fact on
the record, because this too is a useful piece of information
about the man” (Wittgenstein).
In the realm of traditional philosophy, as the analytical philosophers maintained, verification can eliminate much dead wood.
“Philosophy is the disease of which analysis should be the
cure!” (Feigl).
Examples:
F. H. Bradley’s neo-Hegelian assertion that “the Absolute enters into, but is itself incapable of, evolution and progress.”
Heidegger’s existentialist assertion that “the Nothing itself
nothings.”
In such instances, one is reminded of the comment written on a
colleague’s paper by physicist Wolfgang Pauli: “This isn’t
right; it isn’t even wrong."
Verification has no less a valuable role to play in the religious
sphere.
One might say “a more valuable role,” since there are far more
people caught in the net of bad religion than in the net of bad
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philosophy, and the former often creates more personal and societal havoc than the latter (cf. 11 November 2001).
Examples (by no stretch of the imagination an exclusive list) of
religious claims falling under the axe of non-verifiability:
“You can’t say Tao exists / You can’t say Tao does not exist /
But you can find it in the silence, / In wu-wei [deedlessness]”
(Taoist poet Ch’ang-tzu, translated by Robert Van Gulik).
Brahma is All.
Mohammed caused the moon to come down and pass through
his tunic, and this occurred so quickly that no-one noticed that
the moon was missing (“The Prophet’s Miraculous Night Journey").
God is the Wholly Other (Rudolf Otto).
Jesus rose from the dead in Geschichte (supra-history, which
cannot be investigated by the techniques of the historian), not
in ordinary, verifiable Historie (Karl Barth).
God is Being Itself (Paul Tillich).
All illness and evil are an illusion (Christian Science).
Smedley is the reincarnation of an ancient Egyptian sage (Eastern and New Age thinking).
The “Flew-Wisdom parable” serves as a classic reminder of the
need to verify religious claims.
“Once upon a time two explorers came upon a clearing in the
jungle. In the clearing were growing many flowers and many
weeds. One explorer says, ‘Some gardener must tend this plot.’
The other disagrees: “There is no gardener.’ So they pitch their
tents and set a watch. No gardener is ever seen. ‘But perhaps he
is an invisible gardener.’ So they set up a barbed-wire fence.
They electrify it. They patrol with bloodhounds. (For they remember how H. G.Wells’ The Invisible Man could be both
smelt and touched though he could not be seen.) But no shrieks
ever suggest that some intruder has received a shock. No movements of the wire ever betray an invisible climber. The bloodhounds never give cry. Yet still the Believer is not convinced.
‘But there is a gardener, invisible, intangible, insensible to electric shocks, a gardener who has no scent and makes no sound,
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a gardener who comes secretly to look after the garden which
he loves.’ At last the Sceptic despairs, ‘But what remains of
your original assertion? Just how does what you call an invisible, intangible, eternally elusive gardener differ from an imaginary gardener or even from no gardener at all?’”
Attention must be paid to a standard criticism of verifiability,
to wit, that principles of verification are not themselves testable
by the criteria set forth by those principles.
It is claimed that since verification principles are neither true by
definition nor factually testable—and thus, neither analytic nor
synthetic in nature—they themselves must be meaningless.
A verification principle (like methodological principles in general, including induction and scientific method, treated earlier)
is a linguistic proposal (Hempel).
“This does not imply that the principle is regarded as an analytic or necessarily true statement. A principle that expresses a
linguistic recommendation is no doubt closely related to a corresponding analytic statement, but the recommendation itself is
not tautological and uninformative. A recommendation or a decision has a different logical status; it is not successful by being
true or unsuccessful by being false” (R. W. Ashby).
As linguistic proposals, verification principles are perforce not
themselves subject to verification.
Were they verifiable by the terms of the principles themselves,
the result would be perfect circularity; were they verifiable by
some independent criterion of verifiability, one would arrive at
infinite regress.
Sound methodological proposals are accepted on a necessitarian basis, in that whenever the critic herself is forced to make
decisions of a crucial nature in ordinary life, she is found to be
employing the very proposal she is criticising.
And so:
The critic will not invest in shares when the company in question refuses to allow anyone to look at the company books.
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The critic supports Popper’s “Open Society” as against régimes
where there can be no presentation and testing of diverse political positions.
The critic refuses to believe in the existence of ghost who appears in the Haunted House only when no psychical investigators are present.
The critic hesitates to marry a girl who refuses to give him any
information on her background—or who says that if he wants
to check up on her, this demonstrates a lack of real love toward
her.
The critic does not join a sect which declares that space creatures beyond the range of human telescopes wish the members
to engage in collective suicide to enter a Fifth Dimension of
blessedness.
It follows that to discard verification by criticising the original
form of the verifiability principle (“Der Sinn eines Satzes ist
die Methode seiner Verifikation”—Wittgenstein; “The meaning of a proposition is the method of its verification”—Schlick)
is to miss a most important epistemological truth: that claiming
something is not the equivalent of proving it.
3
Historical, jurisprudential, and scientific standards of
evidence offer the touchstone for resolving the religious
predicament by establishing the truth claims of Christian proclamation.
3.1
Historical and legal methods parallel scientific methodology.
3.11
Like the scientist, the historian employs logic, collects facts,
sets forth explanatory constructs to explain the facts, tests the
constructs against the facts, and accepts those explanations
which best accord with the totality of the factual situation (Barzun).
The better the historian, the more she will be aware of her biases and prejudices and will consciously endeavour to put them
aside in order to arrive at the most faithful understanding of the
past.
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Though the historian needs empathy with her subject-matter, it
does not follow, as existentialist historians claim, that the past
is undiscoverable apart from a “life relation” between the historian and what she is investigating—otherwise it would be the
case that “to understand Ghengis Khan the historian must be
someone very like Ghengis Khan” (J. W. N. Watkins).
The good historian will allow the facts to interpret themselves,
in the sense that explanations will be tailored to the facts, rather
than being forced into a Procrustean bed of interpretation.
The historian cannot engage in repeatable experiments because
of the nature of historical subject matter, but, as we have seen,
neither can all scientists (palaeobotanists, astronomers dealing
with distant galaxies no longer in existence); and for precisely
the same reason.
The historian’s conclusions, like those of the scientist, are open
to examination and criticism by others.
“The form of inference used both to interpret perceptions and
to draw conclusions from data . . . has been found reliable in experience, and we conventionally assume it generally produces
true knowledge of the world. Given this assumption it is often
reasonable to believe the best explanation of perceptions is that
they are correct; and to believe that good historical explanations of the perceived data are true. . . Those who deny the possibility of discovering truths about the past have no good reason
for distinguishing historical truth from fiction” (C. B. McCullagh, The Truth of History).
The scientist deals with the present, the historian, with the past;
since the present is but a knife edge which is continuously
transformed into the past, those who deny the ability to arrive
at sound historical knowledge necessarily undermine the possibility of reliable knowledge of present existence (the same
methods being employed to investigate both present and past).
And yet the historical sceptic must rely upon his knowledge of
the present to survive in daily life.
The historical sceptic, to function in the present, employs his
knowledge of the past every waking moment (as in remembering where the bus stop is located so that he can repeat his jour-
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ney of last week); he likewise relies on documents and
testimony for his knowledge of the past, (as in tracing land
records to determine whether a property he desires to purchase
is free of encumbrances).
An historical event, if adequately supported by proper historical method, deserves acceptation wholly apart from questions
as to its importance or consequences.
The historian will not create differing standards of evidence,
depending on the alleged “importance” of the event to be investigaated (for example, requiring an incredibly high level of evidence for matters relating to the life of Christ, since much
depends on that life; but being satisfied with lesser evidence in
support of, say, the accounts of Herodotus).
Were this approach not to be followed, there would be as many
legitimate standards of historical verisimilitude as there are interest groups: for the English and the French, high standards of
investigation for the Battle of Waterloo; for the Chinese, very
low standards—the battle being of little importance in Beijing.
What of Lessing’s “ditch” between history and ultimate certainty (his contention that historical knowledge can never provide us with “the necessary truths of reason,” and thus that no
historical investigations could ever yield absolute truth)?
Wittgenstein himself apparently fell into this error (in dependence upon Platonic idealism?): “God does not reveal himself in
the world” (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 6.432).
Historical knowledge is indeed of a synthetic nature, never rising above probabilities—but, as we have seen, this is true of all
factual knowledge, including present experience; demeaning
the one will necessarily demean the other.
Evidential probability of a historical nature—pace Plantinga—
is thus a friend to religious truth claims, not its enemy
(T. McGrew, “Has Plantinga Refuted the Historical Argument?,” 6/1 Philosophia Christi [2004]).
To assume, on the basis of such a “ditch,” or by way of the similar, more classical principle, finitum non est capax infiniti, that
history cannot reveal eternity, is to make a grandiose, gratuitous and unprovable metaphysical assumption—for how could
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one know that God is incapable of using history to reveal himself? Or that he could not manage an Incarnation? Or that, were
he to do so, we could not recognise it or distinguish it from false
claims?
“We don’t know enough about the unknown to know that it is
unknowable” (G. K. Chesterton).
The historian, no more than the scientist, can rule out the miraculous a priori.
Since neither the historian nor the scientist stands outside the
world, neither has or can have a comprehensive knowledge of
what is possible or impossible within it; neither, therefore, is in
a position to exclude events from consideration, or insist on
“natural” explanations for them, simply because they are
unique in character or offensive to the researcher’s personal
worldview.
Indeed, it is profoundly true that every historical event is
unique.
Legal method closely parallels historical method.
“We have already examined the historian’s procedure in evaluating the testimony of documents and remains. An essentially
similar procedure is followed in the courtroom when the testimony of witnesses is weighed and judged. For the fact to be
proved in a court is of the past, while the testimony or the evidential facts are of the present” (Cohen and Nagel, An Introduction to Logic and Scientific Method).
Legal methodology is committed to a correspondence theory of
truth.
“In the Anglo-American as well as in the Continental European
legal culture the language of the law of evidence conforms to a
correspondence theory of truth. This is no coincidence, since
the meaning of verdicts would be strangely altered, if one of the
rival accounts—especially coherence and pragmatic theories—
should be adopted” (Friedrich Toepel, Universität Bonn,
“Truth in the Law of Evidence”).
Legal methodology, like scientific and historical method, relies
upon probability in arriving at its judgments; it does not expect
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to attain to formal, analytic certainty, nor does it waste time on
mere possibility.
Relevant evidence is defined by the Federal Rules of Evidence
as “evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any
fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action
more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence.”
In the Anglo-American Common Law tradition, civil cases are
typically decided on a “preponderance” of evidence, i.e., a balance of probabilities, and criminal cases employ the test of
“moral certainty, beyond reasonable doubt.”
It will be observed that even in criminal matters, the standard is
not absolute certainty, nor must the trier of fact exclude all
doubt.
After all, entire certainty and zero doubt are not attainable in
the synthetic realm of fact—and few crimes (except in Alice’s
Wonderland) occur in the analytic domain of pure mathematics, deductive logic, or tautology.
Yet courts of law render judgments every day—and must
render judgments every day—which determine critical issues
of person and property; where the death penalty still exists, life
or death hangs on just such determinations.
The importance of legal method lies especially in the fact that
courts of law exist to decide the most intractable conflicts in society (cf. Ch. Perelman, Traité de l’argumentation: La nouvelle
rhétorique).
This methodology has been developed and refined over the
centuries in response to unarguable human need, and there is
remarkable consistency across legal systems in requiring sound
testimonial evidence in order to reach just conclusions.
The Lozi people of Northern Rhodesia/Zimbabwe “distinguish
between different kinds of evidence as hearsay, circumstantial,
and direct, and attach different degrees of cogency to these and
different degrees of credibility to various witnesses” (Max
Gluckman).
The ancient Persian Digest of a Thousand Points of Law begins
with a detailed chapter on the law of Evidence, insisting, as
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does the common law, on “independent and convincing proof”
to support allegations, and setting forth detailed criteria for distinguishing reliable from unreliable testimony (declarations
against interest as opposed to self-serving declarations, etc.).
In Roman law, “when the witnesses for the parties gave conflicting testimony on any point, it was the duty of the judge, not
to count the number on each side, but to consider which of them
were entitled to the greatest credit, according to the well-known
rule, ‘Testimonia ponderanda sunt, non numeranda.’ . . . The
Roman law provided that the benefit of the doubt should be
given to the defendant rather than to the plaintiff” (Lord Mackenzie, Studies in Roman Law, with Comparative Views of the
Laws of France, England, and Scotland; cf. J. Wybo, De interrogationibus in jure [1732]).
For Jewish tribunals of the 1st century, “all evidence must be
direct, and not circumstantial or presumptive. Be the chain of
evidence ever so strong, if not all links are forged by direct eyetestimony, and that of at least two competent witnesses, the accused cannot be adjudged guilty” (S. Mendelsohn, The Criminal Jurisprudence of the Ancient Hebrews, Compiled from the
Talmud and Other Rabbinical Writings, and Compared with
Roman and English Penal Jurisprudence).
If the critic wishes to jettison legal methodology, she risks melting the very glue that holds society together.
But just suppose the application of the very epistemological approach required in legal thinking were to vindicate a particular
religious claim—would that claim not also have then to be accepted?
In the philosophical community, not a few influential contemporary thinkers have concluded that legal method provides a
better potential avenue to truth—including religious truth—
than traditional approaches.
“l.egal rules of evidence are reflections of ‘natural reason,’ and
they could enter into dialogues in several different ways, for
example, to test the validity of theological arguments for the
existence of God” (Jerome Hall).
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“1 am persuaded that God exists, either beyond a reasonable
doubt or by a preponderance of reasons in favor of that conclusion over reasons against it. I am, therefore willing to terminate
tinquiry with the statement that I have reasonable grounds for
affirming God’s existence” (Mortimer Adler).
“To break the power of old models and analogies., we can provide ourselves with a new one. Logic is concerned with the
soundness of the claims we make—with the solidity of the
grounds we produce to support them, the firmness of the backing we provide for them—or, to change the metaphor, with the
sort of case we present in defence of our claims. The legal analogy implied in this last way of putting the point can for once be
a real help. So let us forget about psychology, sociology, technology and mathematics, ignore the echoes of structural engineering and collage in the words ‘grounds’ and ‘backing’, and
take as our model the discipline of jurisprudence. Logic (we
may say) is generalised jurisprudence. Arguments can be compared with law- suits, and the claims we make and argue for in
extra-legal contexts with claims made in the courts, while the
cases we present in making good each kind of claim can be
compared with each other” (Toulmin).
We are therefore entirely justified in employing a combination
of historical and legal techniques to investigate a primary religious claim, that of historic Christianity.
But does not the choice of the Christian claim for investigation
reveal a bias in its favour? No; for the following three reasons:
Firstly, the consideration of a claim by no means predetermines
its validity, any more than the filing of a lawsuit is the equivalent of winning it.
Secondly, if Christianity were found to be true, any religious
affirmations contradicting its teachings must be rejected, so
that by investigating the former we may be said simultaneously
to be treating fundamental claims of the latter.
Thirdly, and most importantly, we can only meaningfully investigate religious claims which allow for factual testing, and
we have already seen that, where virtually all of the religions of
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the world are concerned, such testing is precluded by the nonsynthetic nature of their claims.
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Other than Christianity, only the two other great “historical” religions (Judaism and Islam), and the cult of Mormonism, do not
fall beneath this axe; but their synthetic claims are not sustainable.
3.14311 Judaism depends for its truth on the revelatory character of the
Old Testament, and in particular of the Torah; but the earliest
of all the Old Testament manuscripts (a Dead Sea scroll Isaiah)
cannot be dated earlier than the first century B.C., and so the
documentary evidence offers no primary historical attestation
for the miraculous, allegedly revelatory events recounted in the
Old Testament.
3.143111 To be sure, if the claims of Christ in the New Testament can be
verified, then his stamp of approval on the Old Testament as
revelation would achieve the needed result; but this would not
validate Judaism, with its denial of Jesus’ messiahship.
3.14312 Islam claims that the Qur’an is God’s final revelation to mankind, but, in support of this, we have only Muhammed’s personal claim—and no miraculous evidence to back up that
claim.
3.14313 The Book of Mormon lacks historical credibility, Joseph
Smith’s “witnesses” to its supposed divine origin hardly instill
confidence, and the assertion that the angel Moroni conveniently took the Golden Plates back into heaven leaves us with
an epistemologically untestable claim (Walter R. Martin).
3.15
To decide the Christian truth-claim that in Jesus Christ there
has been a unique and final revelation of God to man, one must
establish the soundness of the primary documents relating to
the life, ministry, and death of Jesus Christ; evaluate the quality
of the testimony to Jesus presented by the witnesses in those
records; determine what Jesus claimed for himself, as set forth
in those documents by those witnesses; and, finally, examine
the evidence, if any, to support these claims and determine
whether that evidence is sufficient to warrant the acceptance of
Jesus’ assertions concerning himself.
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The New Testament documents are the primary-source
records for the determination of Jesus’ life and work and are
historically veracious.
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There are several valuable 1st and early 2nd century references
to the Christian church and to Jesus himself in Jewish and pagan sources (G. Habermas).
These references include, but are not limited to, Josephus, Tacitus, and Pliny the Younger.
Such references make it virtually impossible to deny the historical existence of Jesus: even radical critics such as G. A. Wells
are forced to the conclusion that he did in fact exist.
However, none of these references are in the nature of primary
sources, i.e., they do not derive from persons who themselves
had contact with Jesus.
The only primary documents relevant to the life and ministry of
Jesus are those collected in the New Testament.
We use the term “primary” in the strict historian’s sense of a
source contemporaneous with the events described and deriving from persons who had immediate contact with those events.
If, as will be shown, the New Testament documents do indeed
have primary-source value for the life and activities of Jesus, it
is fallacious to argue that by relying upon them the Christian is
engaged in circular reasoning, in that he is “using the Bible to
prove what he believes about Jesus.”
The fact that excellent documents are collected in an attractive
binding, printed on India paper, and distributed widely for devotional purposes has no relevance whatsoever for determining
their value as historical sources, either positively or negatively.
The standard tests of documentary authenticity are the “bibliographical” or “textual” test, the “internal” test, and the “external” test (C. Sanders, Introduction to Research in English
Literary History).
It cannot be stressed too strongly that such tests are universally
applied—to all historical and literary materials—and are not
the product of religious bias.
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By the bibliographical test, we mean the analysis of the textual
tradition by which the given document reaches us; in the case
of the New Testament documents, the question is: Are the
printed texts as we have them today essentially the same as
when they were originally written, or have they been significantly corrupted in transmission?
The discipline engaged in this determination is that of textual
(or “lower”) criticism; its operations are the same, whether the
text in question is secular or religious, Catullus’ erotic poetry
or the Gospel of John.
After exhaustive examination of the considerable number of
New Testament manuscripts preceding modern printed texts,
which commenced with Erasmus’ Novum Instrumentum of
1516 (the first printed critical edition of the Greek New Testament), the judgment of the lower critics has been unequivocal:
not only is the New Testament text reliable, it is the most reliable of all the texts of Graeco-Roman antiquity.
“The New Testament text . . . is far better attested than that of
any other work of ancient literature. Its problems arise not from
a deficiency of evidence but from an excess of it. In the case of
no work of Greek or Latin literature do we possess manuscripts
so plentiful in number or so near the date of composition. Apart
from Virgil, of whom we have manuscripts written some three
or four hundred years after the poet’s death, the normal position
with regard to the great works of classical literature is that our
knowledge of their text depends upon a few (or at most a few
dozen) manuscripts, of which the earliest may be of the ninth
or tenth or eleventh century, but most of the fifteenth. In these
conditions it generally happens that scientific criticism has selected one manuscript (usually but not necessarily the oldest) as
principal authority, and has based our printed texts on this, with
some assistance from the later and inferior manuscripts and a
liberal use of conjecture. . . . In the case of the New Testament
. . . the vellum manuscripts are far earlier and far more numerous; the gap between the earliest of them and the date of composition of the books is smaller; and a larger number of papyri
have (especially since the discovery of the Chester Beatty papyri), given us better means of bridging the gap. We are far bet-
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ter equipped to observe the earIy stages of textual history in the
manuscript period in the case of the New Testament than of any
other work of ancient literature” (Sir Frederic Kenyon, Recent
Developments in the Textual Criticism of the Greek Bible).
Between the dates of original composition and the earliest complete texts of the Gospels which we possess (Codex Sinaiticus
and Codex Vaticanus), there are extant fragments, quotations,
and lectionary readings going back to the end of the first century and possibly even earlier (Thiede).
This in marked contrast, for example, to the case of the Roman
writer Catullus (1st century B.C)., all our knowledge of whose
textual material is based on a single manuscript of the Italian
Renaissance period, subsequently lost.
“The interval then between the dates of original composition
and the earliest extant evidence becomes so small as to be in
fact negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the
[New Testament] Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed. Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New
Testament may be regarded as finally established” (Sir Frederic
Kenyon, The Bible and Archaeology; Kenyon’s italics).
But what of the claim that, in spite of all that has been said, we
do not have the original autographs of the New Testament documents?
The same is true of the entire corpus of ancient literature—and
much of literary productivity throughout history; we do not
have, for example, a single autograph of a play by Shakespeare,
but this does not at all deter the textual critic from arriving with
confidence at texts which accurately reflects the work of the
original author.
There is no surviving autograph of the present work: but no
problem whatsoever exists in attributing authorship or being
confident of the text.
Muslims invidiously compare the single, standard text of the
Qur’an with the textual variants of the New Testament (as set
forth in such critical editions as the Nestle-Aland Novum Tes-
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tamentum Graece); are we to conclude that the Quranic text is
therefore superior and the New Testament text doubtful?
The reason for the absence of critical variants in the Quranic
text today is that other versions were arbitrarily destroyed:
“There were wide divergences between the collections that had
been digested into Codices in the great Metropolitan centres of
Madina, Mecca, Basra, Kufa and Damascus,” so the solution
hit upon by Uthman, the third Muslim caliph, “was to canonize
the Madinan Codex and order all others to be destroyed” (A.
Jeffery, Materials for the History of the Text of the Qur’an).
What we have, therefore, in the Muslim argument is a classic
non sequitur: the Qur’an is superior (we are told) because there
are no known variants to its text; but what accounts for this absence of variations is the fact that the Muslims themselves
eliminated all versions but today’s standard text, so that now
there is no way of knowing the value of what survives as opposed to what has not.
As for the textual variants in the New Testament documents,
only in the rarest instances do these go to the substance of the
text and in no case do they put in question theological issues.
The 16th-17th century Textus Receptus (employed by Luther
and by the translators of the Authorised Version) is virtually
identical to the more sophisticated Westcott and Hort text of the
late 19th century—the reason being that virtually all scribes of
the pre-modern era so respected the biblical text that they copied it meticulously.
The consequence of our textual argument cannot be too
strongly emphasised: to discount the New Testament documents on textual grounds requires the critic first to discount the
entire body of Graeco-Roman historical and literary remains,
since the textual authority for the latter is considerably inferior
to the textual value of the former.
It may be taken as certain, therefore, that anyone who selectively rejects the New Testament documents but retains confidence in the documents of secular antiquity is either ignorant of
the facts or so biased against the case for Jesus Christ that she
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prefers irrationality to what she perceives as the dangers of
Christian commitment.
The internal test of documentary reliability asks: What do the
texts claim for themselves?
Here, historical and literary scholarship continues to follow Aristotle’s dictum (fundamental also to the rules of legal evidence) that the benefit of the doubt is to be given to the
document itself, not arrogated by the critic to herself (De Arte
Poetica, 1460b-1461b).
In the case of the New Testament documents, they claim either
to have been written by eyewitnesses of the events recounted
(e.g., John’s Gospel and Epistles, Peter’s Epistles) or to have
been written by close associates of eyewitnesses and based
upon careful research (e.g., Luke’s writings).
To discount such claims on an objective basis would require
better sources refuting what the New Testament materials say
of themselves; such sources do not exist.
The external test of documentary attribution and authenticity
focuses on materials outside of the texts in question which may
be capable of confirming what those texts say about themselves.
It is always possible in theory for a document, like a witness, to
make claims that are not true; external confirmation is therefore
an important avenue for eliminating such mendacity.
For secular texts of the classical world, external assistance is
very rarely available, owing to the paucity of confirmatory
source material.
For the New Testament, however, such confirmation is readily
available. Thus:
Papias of Hieropolis (ca. 130), on the basis of information obtained from the “Elder” (Apostle) John, informs us that Mark
recorded what the Apostle Peter had told him—and that “he
paid attention to this one thing, not to omit anything that he had
heard, nor to include any false statement among them” (Eusebius, H. E., 3.39, 5.20).
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That the “Elder” John was in fact the Apostle John (the writer
of the books attributed to him in the New Testament) has been
demonstrated by such eminent New Testament scholars as
Theodor Zahn—and even by some less eminent (J. A. T. Robinson).
Irenaeus, a student of Polycarp of Smyrna, who in turn had
been a disciple of John himself and had heard from him and
from others personally acquainted with Jesus eyewitness accounts of Jesus, states: “Matthew published his Gospel among
thc Hebrews in their own tongue, when Peter and Paul were
preaching the gospel in Rome and founding the church there.
After their departure [i.e., death, which occurred at the time of
the Neronian persecution in 64-65], Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, himself handed down to us in writing the substance of Peter’s preaching. Luke, the follower of Paul, set
down in a book the gospel preached by his teacher. Then John,
the disciple of the Lord, who also leaned on his breast [John
13:25, 21: 20], himself produced his Gospel, while he was living at Ephesus in Asia” (Adv. Haer. 3.1).
What principally distinguishes the New Testament records
from the so-called Gnostic and Apocryphal gospels is the absence, in their case, of any external confirmation of authorship,
date, or provenance that would give them primary-source value
for the life and ministry of Jesus.
It follows therefore, that where Gnostic and Apocryphal writings attribute acts or teachings to Jesus which cannot be confirmed in the New Testament records, they have no necessary
historical worth; and where they contradict the New Testament
records, they must be rejected.
It follows from the preceding analysis and evidence that the
New Testament documents, with the exception of John’s Gospel, should all be dated prior to the Fall of Jerusalem in A.D.
70; and that John’s Gospel had its origin ca. 95, not long before
John’s death in Ephesus.
This was the conclusion of W. F. Albright, the foremost American biblical archeologist of the late 20th century; it was also the
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conclusion to which J. A. T. Robinson arrived (even dating
John’s Gospel before 70).
There exists a fragment of the Fourth Gospel which must be
dated no later than the end of the 1st century, thus eliminating
the speculations of such critics as Bultmann that that Gospel reflects 2nd century Gnostic influences.
Those who employ later dating invariably do so because of
their anti-miraculous bias (“Jesus predicted the Fall of Jerusalem in the Gospel records, so, since genuine prophecy is impossible, the records must have been written after the event
prophesied”); contra G. P. Holford, The Destruction of Jerusalem (1805).
It should not be necessary to point out, as emphasised previously, that disbelief in miracles is no proper ground for
historical conclusions which fly in the face of sound factual
evidence.
Such fallacious reasoning is endemic among the “higher critics,” whom we shall treat shortly.
The legitimacy for the early dating of the New Testament materials is based, not only on the evidence of authorship by contemporaries of the Apostles but also on powerful inferential
reasoning; thus (following Harnack):
[Where > signifies “must have occurred later than” :] Paul dies
in A.D. 64-65 > Book of Acts (which does not refer to Paul’s
death but would have done so had he already died) > Gospel of
Luke (which constitutes “part one” of Acts and is referred to in
the preface of Acts as written earlier) > Gospel of Mark (which
was employed as one of the sources of Luke’s Gospel), and
probably Matthew as well (tied in content, as it is, to Mark and
Luke) > Jesus’ ministry (ca. A.D. 30).
From such reasoning, it follows that the Synoptic Gospels must
have been written within a thirty-five year period following Jesus’ crucifixion, and it is hardly likely that the authors waited
until just before Paul died to do so.
When one is aware of the high standards of retention of oral
material among the Jews of the time, and the respect which Jesus’ hearers accorded to his words and acts, one has every rea-
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son to consider the New Testament documents as a highly
accurate record of Jesus’ deeds and utterances.
It was a Jewish custom at the time (and it has continued
throughout Jewish history to a significant extent) to memorise
a Rabbi’s teaching—for a good pupil was like a “plastered cistern that loses not a drop” (Mishna Aboth, 2.8).
Legal scholarship conjoins with good historical scholarship in
regarding the New Testament documents as trustworthy.
These documents would be received as competent evidence under the Common Law “ancient documents” rule (Simon Greenleaf).
Ancient documents are received as competent evidence if they
are “fair on their face” (i.e., offer no internal evidence of tampering) and have been maintained in “reasonable custody” (i.e.,
their preservation has been consistent with their content).
Thus, the New Testament records would be admitted into evidence, whereas one of the alleged testaments of Howard
Hughes, found among the Mormons, would not.
To be sure, the application of the ancient documents rule
merely allows for the admission of documents; the question of
how trustworthy they are—how much weight should be given
to them—is a decision for the trier of fact.
But, in setting forth the evidence of the dates, authorship, and
provenance of the New Testament records, we have already
shown how solid those documents are; and we shall shortly be
offering equally good grounds for accepting the testimony they
contain.
Could not the New Testament records nonetheless have been
“faked”?
“[What] renders the argument invalid is a fact about fakes of all
kinds which I learned myself in the course of a case I did in
which there was in question the authenticity of a painting purporting to be by, and to be signed by, Modigliani. This painting,
as the result of my Advice on Evidence, was shown to be a fake.
. . . Although fakes can often be made which confuse or actually
deceive contemporaries of the faker, the experts, or even the
not so expert, of a later age can invariably detect them, whether
fraudulent or not, because the faker cannot fail to include stylistic or other material not obvious to contemporaries because
they are contemporaries, but which stand out a mile to later observers because they reflect the standards, or the materials, or
the styles of a succeeding age to that of the author whose work
is being faked” (Lord Hailsham of St Marylebone).
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Do not “assured results of modern biblical criticism” destroy
the force of the foregoing argument for the soundness of the
New Testament documents?
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Even the most radical of the biblical critics has to accept the results of the bibliographical test which establishes the transmissional reliability of the New Testament documents.
Moreover, even after the most extreme criticism has been exercised, the critics themselves have not been able to excise central, miraculous elements from the narratives (G. Habermas).
For example, the discovery of the empty tomb on Easter morning—accepted by the great majority of critics because that discovery by women would have been so unlikely a fabrication in
the context of male-dominated 1st century Judaism.
How, then, in spite of having to agree with the textual (lower)
critics as to the value of the New Testament texts, do the higher
(form- and redaction-) critics conclude that the life of Jesus, as
set forth therein, is not—regardless of the asseverations of the
writers—an accurate, historically reliable account, but is instead a theological product of “the faith experiences of the early
church”?
The higher critics analyse the texts, identifying what they believe to be irregularities and inconsistencies in style and content; these are explained as the result of multiple authorship and
the later editing and redacting of the materials by diverse faithorientations within the early Christian community.
This hypothesis faces the following insuperable objections:
No documentary evidence whatsoever exists to show the multiple authorship of New Testament books, i.e., no manuscripts
of “pre-edited” material have ever been found; nor have any ac-
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counts been discovered which describe the redaction of the
books by churchmen or by early Christian communities.
Indeed, the early church and its spokesmen are uniform in their
affirmations of respect for the Apostolic writings and the need
to follow them without question.
The conclusion seems inescapable that the methodology of the
higher critic is a subjective one, dependent on the critic’s views
as to what constitutes a consistent literary product.
It appears that what the critic is actually saying is that, were she
to have written the book in question, she would not have written it that way; but perhaps that is why, in the ways of Providence, higher critics were not chosen as biblical authors.
Higher critical method has been weighed in the balance and
found wanting when used to establish the authenticity of writings in other scholarly fields.
Ugaritic scholarship discarded prior efforts to find multiple authorship on the basis of variation in the use of divine names
(Cyrus Gordon).
“If we applied the criterion of ‘Divine names’ to Ugaritic,
Egyptian, or Arabic texts, we should see that the principle was
not valid. I could multiply examples for all other criteria of the
documentary hypothesis” (E. Yamauchi).
Classical scholars, having attempted to locate multiple authors
and establish the redaction of the Homeric poems, now conclude that “if the Iliad and the Odyssey were not written by
Homer, they were written by someone of the same name who
lived about the same time” (H. Caplan).
“The chief weapon of the separatists has always been literary
criticism, and of this it is not too much to say that such niggling
word-baiting, such microscopic hunting of minute inconsistencies and flaws in logic, has hardly been seen, outside of the Homeric field, since Rymar and John Dennis died” (H. J. Rose,
Handbook of Greek Literature from Homer to the Age of Lucian).
Efforts to show the redaction of the English ballads were given
up because the time span was considered too short for such a
process (John Drinkwater, English Poetry); yet “no Gospel sec-
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tion passed through such a long period of oral tradition as did
any genuine ballad” (McNeile and Williams, Introduction to
the Study of the New Testament).
C. S. Lewis (essay on “Modern Theology and Biblical Criticism”) pointed out that interpreters of his Narnian Chronicles
had not in a single instance been successful in isolating his
sources, even though they were his contemporaries, employing
the same language he used; Lewis then wondered why biblical
critics, working with material two thousand years old and in ancient languages, think that they can succeed in a parallel endeavour.
Legal scholarship, with no literary axe to grind, has found the
work of the biblical higher critics “curious”:
“It is astonishing that while Graeco-Roman historians have
been growing in confidence, the twentieth-century study of the
Gospel narratives, starting from no less promising material, has
taken so gloomy a turn in the development of form-criticism
that the more advanced exponents of it apparently maintain—
so far as an amateur can understand the matter—that the historical Christ is unknowable and the history of his mission cannot
be written. This seems very curious when one compares the
case for the best-known contemporary of Christ, who like
Christ is a well-documented figure—Tiberius Caesar. The
story of his reign is known from four sources, the Annals of
Tacitus and the biography of Suetonius, written some eighty or
ninety years later, the brief contemporary record of Velleius
Paterculus, and the third century history of Cassius Dio. These
disagree amongst themselves in the wildest possible fashion,
both in major matters of political action or motive and in specific details of minor events. Everyone would admit that Tacitus is the best of all the sources, and yet no serious modern
historian would accept at face value the majority of the statements of Tacitus about the motives of Tiberius. But this does
not prevent the belief that the material of Tacitus can be used to
write a history of Tiberius” (A. N. Sherwin-White, Roman Society and Roman Law in the New Testament).
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What of the mediating scholars, generally of evangelical persuasion (Gundry, Osborne), and particularly found in the British Isles (Tyndale House, N. T. Wright), who believe that a
mild, chastened, baptised higher criticism can be productively
employed in New Testament scholarship?
This viewpoint partakes of the classic failing of “the curate’s
egg”: the fact that a minute portion may not be bad does not
warrant eating it.
If a methodology is fundamentally flawed—as is higher criticism by the inherent subjectivity of its analysis—it must be rejected per se and not employed selectively (G. Maier; E.
Linnemann).
If, on occasion, the results of a bad methodology are not themselves bad, that hardly vindicates the method.
Even if it were possible to remove the anti-supernaturalistic
bias from higher criticism—which is by no means certain—this
would not correct its subjectivism.
We have already seen how a bias against veridical prophecy
leads the higher critics to postdate Gospel materials after A.D.
70—against the full weight of evidence in favour of their having been written within a generation of the events in the life of
Jesus.
The subjectivity of higher critical method is particularly evident from the fact that the critics cannot agree among themselves as to the particular “sources” behind biblical materials—
much less as to where one source leaves off and another begins.
Probative is the very short history of the once projected “Polychrome Bible,” which was to show in colours the different alleged strands underlying the received text and employed by the
“redactors” to arrive at it; but the Polychrome Bible was never
published, owing to the fact that the critics could not agree
amongst themselves as to the sources.
To bypass this difficulty, the end-of-the-20th-century “Jesus
Seminar” (Robert W. Funk, Gerd Luedemann, et al.) has resorted to voting on the reliability of Gospel pericopes, thus
avoiding the need for unanimity—surely a damning admission
as to the inadequacy of the higher critical method itself.
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Computer-assisted efforts to establish the “true,” underlying
authorship and provenance of New Testament writings have
led to most unsatisfactory results.
MacGregor and Morton fed the “literary style” of Romans and
Galatians into a computer, so as to compare them with the other
New Testament letters claiming to be Pauline; their conclusion:
none of these other works were written by Paul. Then the MacGregor and Morton book on the subject was itself subjected to
computer analysis using parallel criteria, proving that their
work was actually a product of multiple authorship.
Style and vocabulary are not sufficiently stable criteria for determining questions of authorship.
Parts one and two of Goethe’s Faust would never be considered
the work of a single author on the application of such criteria—
but Goethe in fact wrote both; compare John’s Gospel and the
Revelation of St. John.
Would the single authorship of one’s love letters and academic
productions survive higher critical analysis?
“Many measures are extremely sensitive to a text’s length
(measured in number of words) and to its subject content.
Longer texts and specialist texts prepared for expert audiences,
for example, may have larger vocabularies than shorter texts
and those written for general audiences. Genre, too, has an impact. A collection of newspaper articles and an autobiographical account all by the same author may differ considerably in
their measurable style. Clearly, then, stylistic analyses are fallible and cannot provide positive identification of a text’s authorship or literary heritage” (D. I. Greenstein, A Historian’s
Guide to Computing).
As for the anti-supernaturalism of the critics, it is worth noting
that since the New Testament materials are thoroughly impregnated with miraculous occurrences, from the Virgin Birth of Jesus to his resurrection from the dead, the rejection of such
material makes it logically impossible to retain the non-miraculous as representing an accurate record of his life and work.
Thus, the illogic of such efforts as the so-called Jefferson Bible,
in which the third American president (a Deistic rationalist) in-
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cluded only Jesus’ moral teachings after excising all the miraculous elements from the Gospel accounts.
Thus also (to take but a single current example), the critics’ oftrepeated comment that, after all, the Virgin Birth accounts appear only in two Gospels (Matthew and Luke) and so, presumably, can be rejected; but they disregard the fact that this is
equally the case with the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount
(a favourite of those liberal critics themselves).
One cannot have it both ways: either none of the material is of
historical value or all of it must be taken seriously, since the authorship and dating issues are identical for the material in its totality.
As in the legal construction of documents, integrated texts are
to be viewed as a whole: “Lord Justice Peter Gibson said it was
possible for a court to find that part of a will did have the
knowledge and approval of the deceased and that another part
did not. But the circumstances in which it would be proper to
find such a curate’s egg would be rare” (Fuller v Strum, Times
Law Report, 22 January 2002, finding that the will, in its entirety, was valid).
Do not the alleged “contradictions” in the New Testament material support the need for a higher critical analysis of the texts?
Not at all, for:
The burden falls on the critic to show the existence of contradictions, and she cannot discharge that burden.
In most instances, the critic is not aware of the definition of a
logical contradiction, namely, two incompatible states of affairs, one of which cannot logically exist at the same time or
place, or under the same conditions, as the other.
Is it a “contradiction” when the Gospel of John records that Jesus cleansed the Temple early in his ministry, whilst the Synoptic Gospels speak of a cleansing of the Temple at the end of
his ministry? Only if one assumes that there was one, and only
one, cleansing; but that is not required by the language of the
texts.
Considering the condition of the Temple at the time, might we
wonder why Jesus did not clean it out every Sabbath?
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We have already noted that it is a fundamental principle of responsible literary criticism always to give the benefit of doubt
to the writing; this principle is honoured only in the breach by
the higher critics of the New Testament documents.
3.4
The New Testament documents are not only textually sound:
they provide reliable testimony concerning the life and work
of Jesus.
3.41
It is of course possible for well-authenticated historical records
to contain testimony of little worth.
For example, Mason Weems’ biography of George Washington.
But this hardly justifies skepticism as to testimony in general
(as C. A. J. Coady and others have shown).
Legal scholarship is especially useful in providing critieria for
sound witness statements, since courts of law rely upon testimony as their chief source of evidence.
The point de départ is the basic principle, applicable, not just
to the accused but also to witnesses in general, that one is innocent until proven guilty—not the converse.
The burden falls, then, on whoever wishes to show that a witness is not telling the truth.
The McCloskey-Schoenberg standard, fourfold test for identifying perjured testimony can be usefully applied to the New
Testament witnesses to Jesus Christ.
That test entails examining alleged “internal defects” in the
witness himself (W-I) and also in the testimony he presents (TI), and a similar examination of “external defects” in the witness (W-X) and in his testimony (T-X).
Considering W-I: In the case of the Gospel witnesses to Jesus,
did they possess characteristics or have a past history suggesting that they were “inherently untrustworthy, unreliable or undependable”? Were they pathological liars? Did they have
criminal records? Were they mythomanes?
To ask the question is to answer it—in the negative.
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They baldly assert (and the burden of proving the contrary
rests, as always, on the critic): “We have not followed cunningly devised fables [Gk., mythoi] when we made known to
you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were
eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:16).
W-X: What about “motives to falsify,” i.e., external, environmental factors which would lead otherwise truthful witnesses
to lie?
Everything in the pagan and Jewish context would have pushed
the New Testament witnesses in exactly opposite direction, for
by insisting on Jesus as the Divine Messiah they alienated both
Jews and Romans, lost their societal status and possessions,
and, in the case of the Apostles, forfeited their lives as well.
As for the argument that Jesus’ own influence over his followers was doubtless so powerful that it warped their judgment,
pushing them to fabrication on his behalf, we have only to note
that Jesus himself was committed to the highest standards of
truth-telling and categorically opposed to lying: he taught that
lying was of the Devil (John 8: 44).
T-I: As for the testimony presented by the New Testament witnesses, when examined only with reference to itself, can it be
impeached for internal inconsistencies or contradictions?
The four Gospel accounts are certainly not identical; but, rather
than indicating unreliability, this fact supports their genuineness, since it argues against collusion (E. H. Bennett).
Each Gospel writer views the events of Jesus’ ministry from the
standpoint of his own concerns (e.g., Matthew, writing primarily to a Jewish community, stresses the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy in Jesus’ activities; Mark, writing a
catechetical treatise primarily to Gentiles, leaves out many details; Luke, a physician, stresses the medical aspects of events):
all of this increases, rather than decreases, the credibility of the
narratives.
No one of the Gospel accounts claims completeness, so it is
consistent with their character to employ them in a complementary way, harmonising the four accounts with each other.
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Thus, to take a single example, the partial genealogies of Jesus
in Matthew and Luke can be reconciled by regarding one as paternal (focusing on Joseph’s family) and the other maternal
(Mary’s family record) (W. F. Arndt).
Such harmonisation is entirely feasible, as can be seen in the
harmonies of the Gospels from early Christian times, and also
in modern works such as John Wenham’s demonstration of the
consistency of the narratives of Jesus’ resurrection.
We have already observed that the “contradictions” cited by the
critics stem largely from a misunderstanding of the nature of
logical contradiction.
The New Testament witnesses’ lack of defensiveness and willingness to put themselves in a poor light supports the transparency of the Gospel materials (the portrait of Peter in the
Gospels being an especially powerful example).
These documents have “the ring of truth” (J. B. Phillips).
T-X: Is there external evidence which would impugn the veracity of the testimony contained in the New Testament documents?
As noted earlier, there are no other contemporary accounts of
Jesus having primary-source value by which they can be criticised.
Jewish records of the time do not impugn the New Testament
accounts; thus, the trial of Christ has been vindicated historically by the best authorities (Blinzler, Der Prozess Jesu; J. Imbert, Le Procès de Jésus).
Secular history does not contradict the New Testament accounts; attempts to show that they do, fail on more careful analysis, as the following examples of fallacious criticism (L.
Grabbe) demonstrate:
Luke, says Grabbe, wrongly refers to a census under Quirinius
at the birth of Jesus. However, Luke’s reference is a perfectly
proper one to a general census authorised by Augustus and carried out in the days of Herod (Sir William Ramsey, A. N. Sherwin-White, Ethelbert Stauffer).
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In Acts 12, says Grabbe, Luke improperly designates Agrippa
I as “Herod” when this was not his proper name. However, the
reference “testifies that the king is being viewed typologically,
as another persecutor in the Church’s Judaean history, following Herod, Herod Antipas, Herodias and the Herodians, who
figure as persecutors in the Gospel stories” (D, Schwartz, in
Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum).
Mark 6, says Grabbe, incorrectly states that Herodias was the
wife of Philip, whereas her daughter Salome was Philip’s wife.
But “the full name of Herodias’ first husband is unknown, [and]
no evidence exists that it was not Herod Philip”; moreover, as
for Salome, “she was later married to the tetrarch Herod
Philip”—her own half-uncle (W. Lane, following Lenski). Further, the problem reading “of Philip” does not even appear in
the 3rd century Chester Beatty papyrus (p45 ) of the Marcan text
(Vincent Taylor).
Modern archaeology—a source of information far less subject
to manipulation than literary sources—has confirmed again
and again the reliability of New Testament geography, chronology, and general history (E. M. Blaiklock; E. M. Yamauchi).
Thus, whereas critics prior to 1961 speculated that Pontius Pilate was a creation of the Gospel writers (!), archaeologists discovered in that year the now famous “Pilate inscription,”
definitively showing the historical soundness of the New Testament references to him.
In sum: the Gospel testimony to Jesus Christ survives the application of all four limbs of the McCloskey-Schoenberg construct for attacking perjury.
Legal specialists have analysed how very difficult it is to engage in successful lying in the hostile presence of cross-examiners.
“The person with a wide angle of divergence between what is
recalled and the impression sought to be given is . . . at an almost helpless disadvantage, especially if confronting a crossexaminer who understands the predicament” (R. A. Givens,
Advocacy).
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The functional equivalent of cross-examination, in the case of
the New Testament witnesses, was the Jewish religious community and especially its leadership, who had the means, the
motive, and the opportunity to refute what the witnesses were
saying about Jesus had it been false.
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Means: The life of Jesus was an open book, the events of which
took place within the purview of the Jewish community of the
time; and Jesus’ disciples followed his instruction to preach
“first to the Jew”—going first to the Synagogues, where they
encountered the very religious leaders who opposed Jesus.
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Motive: The leaders of the Judaism of the time, though divided
amongst themselves in many respects (Pharisees, Sadducees)
were united in their desire to get rid of Jesus, and they were instrumental in bringing about his execution (J. Imbert, Le
Procès de Jésus); it is therefore unthinkable that they would not
have refuted inaccurate or false claims about him from their
own knowledge.
3.45221 Moreover, these religious leaders regarded themselves as specialists on the Old Testament, and would have been quick to refute the witnesses’ constant references to fulfilled Old
Testament prophecies in the life and ministry of Jesus (e.g.,
birth at Bethlehem, flight to Egypt, betrayal for thirty pieces of
silver, etc., etc.).
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Opportunity: As community leaders, they had the ear of the
public; as literate clergy, they were in an ideal position to memorialise for posterity any fabrications in the testimony of the
early witnesses to Jesus’ career.
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But not a word of refutation comes from these contemporaneous sources.
3.45241 The destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 cannot be used to argue that such refutations have been lost, for
3.452411 Jewish writings did successfully survive that catastrophe; and
3.452412 The early Christian witnesses preached the same message in
Jewish settlements throughout the Roman world (the Jews of
the Diaspora, nota bene, were not rendered mute by the Fall of
Jerusalem); and
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3.4525
“It was not only friendly eyewitnesses that the early preachers
had to reckon with; there were others less well disposed who
were also conversant with the main facts of the ministry and
death of Jesus. The disciples could not afford to risk inaccuracies (not to speak of willful manipulation of the facts), which
would at once be exposed by those who would be only too glad
to do so. On the contrary, one of the strong points in the original
apostolic preaching is the confident appeal to the knowledge of
the hearers; they not only said, ‘We are witnesses of these
things,’ but also, ‘As you yourselves also know’ (Acts 2:22).
Had there been any tendency to depart from the facts in any material respect, the possible presence of hostile witnesses in the
audience would have served as a further corrective” (F. F.
Bruce).
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In sum, the quality of the witness testimony to Jesus is impeccable—which should not be surprising, considering the fact
that the relevant documents, as we have seen, derive from firsthand contact with him or with his immediate followers.
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“All that Christianity asks of men on this subject, is, that they
would be consistent with themselves; that they would treat its
evidences as they treat the evidence.of other things; and that
they would try and judge its actors and witnesses, as they deal
with their fellow men, when testifying to human affairs and actions, in human tribunals. Let the witnesses be compared with
themselves, with each other, and with surrounding facts and
circumstances; and let their testimony be sifted, as it were
given in a court of justice, on the side of the adverse party, the
witness being subjected to a rigorous cross-examination. The
result, it is confidently believed, will be an undoubting conviction of their integrity, ability, and truth. In the course of such an
examination, the undesigned coincidences will multiply upon
us at every step in our progress; the probability of the veracity
of the witnesses and of the reality of the occurrences which
they relate will increase, until it acquires, for all practical purposes, the value and force of demonstration” (Simon Greenleaf).
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3.5
According to the uniform testimony of the primary-source
documents, Jesus claimed for himself no less than divine status.
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If we go to what is widely regarded as the earliest of the Gospels, he begins his ministry by forgiving sin—and “who can
forgive sin, but God only?” (Mark 2).
This claim cannot be successfully weakened by Jesus’ reference to himself as “Son of man”; to the contrary, that expression, as his Jewish hearers well knew, derived from the
apocalyptic literature of the Old Testament (Daniel 7:13 and
Ezekiel), and signified that Jesus regarded himself as the divine
Messiah.
The same Gospel concludes with Jesus before the High Priest,
where Jesus is condemned for blasphemy for declaring: “You
will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of Power, and
coming with the clouds of heaven” (Mark 14).
Matthew’s Gospel, with its Synoptic parallels, presents Jesus
as divine Saviour.
He is given the name Jesus, “for he shall save his people from
their sins” (Matthew 1).
He declares: “The Son of man came to give his life a ransom
for many” (Matthew 20; cf. Mark 10) and “The Son of man has
come to save that which was lost” (Matthew 18; cf. Luke15 and
19).
At the end of his earthly ministry, the resurrected Jesus’
charges his disciples: “All power is given unto me in heaven
and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have
commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the
end of the world” (Matthew 28).
The Fourth Gospel records Jesus’ frequent “I am” sayings (“I
am the light of the world,” “I am the bread of life,” “I am the
way, the truth , and the life: no-one comes to the Father but by
me,” etc.)—by which he alludes to, and identifies himself with,
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the “I am that I am” revelations of the God of the Old Testament (Exodus 3:14, et al.).
Jesus asserts his pre-existence and thus his transcendent nature:
“Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8).
When Philip asks Jesus, “Show us the Father,” Jesus replies—
identifying himself unqualifiedly with the God of the Old Testament—“He who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14).
When Jesus, after his resurrection, appears to “doubting” Thomas, Thomas declares, and Jesus accepts the declaration, “My
Lord and my God [Gk., ho kyrios mou kai ho theos mou]” (John
20).
Attempts by Jehovah’s Witnesses to deny John’s attribution of
Deity to Jesus in John 1:1 (“The Word was God . . . and the
Word was made flesh”), owing to the absence of the definite article before the Greek word for God, fail because of the presence of that article in Thomas’ declaration—and because what
in fact accounts for the missing article in John 1:1 is simply the
reversed word-order (E. C. Colwell).
Passages commonly cited by Moslems, Unitarians, and humanists to argue that Jesus considered himself at best a unique
prophet and moral teacher, but not the incarnate God (e.g., Matthew 19:17, Mark 13:32) are explicable if we keep in mind that
Jesus was fully man as well as fully God.
If, however, these passages are understood to remove Jesus’
claims to Deity, there is no way to explain the passages previously cited, in which Jesus unequivocally affirms his Divine
status.
Here one follows the common rules both of literary hermeneutics and of the jurisprudential construction of documents
that “clear passages are to interpret unclear passages”—not the
reverse; and that one is to seek to avoid contradiction in the interpretation of texts.
The writers of the New Testament documents and the earliest
Christians follow Jesus’ own declarations concerning himself
and consistently present him as no less than God almighty,
come to earth to die for the sins of the world and the only way
of salvation.
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Mark opens his Gospel by quoting Malachi 3:1, but with a
highly significant alteration, showing that he considered Jesus
to be the God of the Old Testament, whose coming had been
prophetically promised: “Behold, I [Jehovah] will send my
messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me”; Mark
modifies the verse to read, “ he shall prepare thy way,” i.e., Jesus’ way.
For a Jew, such a change would have been a blasphemous alteration of the sacred Old Testament text—unless Jesus were in
fact identical with the Jehovah to which the passage referred.
Luke, author of the Third Gospel and the Book of Acts, records
the Apostolic preaching as asserting, “There is salvation in no
one else [other than Jesus], for there is no other name under
heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts
4).
The letters of the Apostle Paul, which comprise the bulk of the
New Testament and were written as early as, or even earlier
than, the earliest of the Gospels, present Jesus as God Incarnate.
“At the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on
earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord” (Philippians 2).
World history shall end when “the Lord Jesus shall be revealed
from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking
vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thessalonians 1).
With the phrases “Our God and Father and our Lord Jesus
Christ” (1 Thessalonians 3) and “Our Lord Jesus Christ and
God our Father” (2 Thessalonians 2), Paul uses a singular verb;
for him, Jesus and the God of the Old Testament are one and
the same and the common object of prayer.
The early Christian church was likewise committed to a divine
Jesus, based upon his own declarations concerning himself.
The very first description of Christian worship from the pen of
a non-Christian states: “On an appointed day they [Christians]
were accustomed to meet before daybreak and to recite a hymn
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antiphonally to Christ, as to God” (Pliny the Younger, Epis. x.
96; ca. A.D. 112).
Worth remembering is the ferociously monotheistic nature of
Jewish belief (“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one
Lord”—Deuteronomy 6): no Jewish convert to Christianity
would have worshipped Jesus without believing him to be identical to the God of the Old Testament.
Attempts during the 19th century to create a humanistic, progressivistic, evolutionary Jesus in the image of the age were definitively ended by Albert Schweitzer’s Quest of the Historical
Jesus, which (in spite of Schweitzer’s personal lack of faith in
a divine Jesus) showed that, if one is to take the primary
sources seriously, one must admit that Jesus considered himself
the apocalyptic Messiah who would judge the world at the end
of time.
In his Strasbourg dissertation for the medical doctorate, Schweitzer endeavoured to exonerate Jesus from the charge of
mental illness; but, as the psychiatrist editor of the English version points out, this attempt was not necessarily successful,
since sane people do not consider themselves God, and for a
person not to know who he really is indicates severe psychological abnormality.
If, then, Jesus was not God, he was likely insane, for he certainly thought of himself in divine terms.
But many in the psychiatric profession have regarded Jesus as
the teacher of mental health par excellence.
“If you were to take the sum total of all authoritative articles
ever written by the most qualified of psychologists and psychiatrists on the subject of mental hygiene . . . you would have an
awkward and incomplete summation of the Sermon on the
Mount. And it would suffer immeasurably through comparison. . . . Here . . . rests the blueprint for successful human life
with optimum mental health and contentment” (Dr J. T.
Fisher).
The only other humanistic alternative, then, would be to say
that Jesus knew himself not to be God but claimed it anyway—
the problem here being that Jesus’ high moral character (as ad-
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mitted even by unbelievers) makes this a particularly unattractive choice.
“The character of Jesus has not only been the highest pattern of
virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practice, and has exerted so deep an influence, that it may be truly said, that the
simple record of three short years of active life has done more
to regenerate and to soften mankind, than all the disquisitions
of philosophers and than all the exhortations of moralists” (W.
E. H. Lecky, History of European Morals).
Since there is no realistic factual possibility of regarding Jesus
as one who viewed himself as but a simple moral teacher (a
kind of Jewish boy scout helping little, old ladies across the Sea
of Galilee), and since to consider him insane or an ethical charlatan makes even less sense, there appears to be only a single
satisfactory explanation for his claiming to be God, namely,
that that was exactly who he is.
3.6
To be sure, even the most attractive claim to divine status requires proof; and, in Jesus’ case, unlike that of history’s false
messiahs and gurus, the necessary proof is available by way
of his miraculous resurrection from the dead.
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The resurrection constitutes an event subject to investigation:
its synthetic character removes the central Christian claim that
“God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself” from
the realm of technical meaninglessness into which, as we have
seen, so many religious claims fall.
“If Christ did not rise from the dead, we are of all people the
most miserable” (Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15): Christian faith,
from its earliest days, has not been afraid of testability—or of
its mirror image, falsifiability.
Why should Jesus’ resurrection be accepted as factual?
Firstly, it is recorded in the same sound, primary-source documents, and by the same sane and sober witnesses, as all the
other events of Jesus’ life.
Secondly, Jesus’ death by crucifixion is recorded in agonising
detail, leaving no doubt that he did in fact die on the cross.
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“Clearly, the weight of historical and medical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead before the wound to his side was inflicted and supports the traditional view that the spear, thrust
between his right ribs, probably perforated not only the right
lung but also the pericardium and heart and thereby ensured his
death” (JAMA 1986; 255: 1455-1463).
The medical evidence puts paid to every variety of “swoon theory” (à la Venturini, Schonfield [The Passover Plot], etc.).
Moreover, “it is impossible that a being who had stolen halfdead out of the sepulchre, who crept about weak and ill, wanting medical treatment, who required bandaging, strengthening,
and indulgence, and who still at last yielded to his sufferings,
could have given the disciples the impression that he was a conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life” (the sceptic
Strauss).
Such a Christ “would himself have been a party to a gross deception; and this, we imagine, no intelligent critic would suggest” (Sir Norman Anderson).
And, if this bizarre theory were to be accepted, what happened
to Jesus afterwards? Such speculation leaves us precisely
where we started.
Thirdly, Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances are described in
minute detail, and they are of an indubitably physical nature.
The resurrected Jesus ate with his disciples (Luke 24, John 21).
Thomas had physical contact with the resurrected Jesus (John
20).
But can we rely on the eyewitness identifications? Do not witnesses make mistaken identifications? Might not the witnesses
have taken someone else for Jesus?
Specialists agree that “the better acquainted a witness is with a
subject, the more likely it is that the witness’ identification will
be accurate” and that “in an eyewitness context, the greatest
challenge to the advocate’s power of persuasion is presented by
the attempt to argue, without support from expert testimony,
the unreliability of an unimpeached eyewitness’ identification
of a prior acquaintance” (Arnolds, et al., Eyewitness Testimony; cf. E. Loftus; A. Heaton-Armstrong).
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The witnesses to Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances had had
intimate contact with him throughout an immediately prior
three-year ministry; it is therefore inconceivable that they
would have mistaken him for a third party.
Fourthly, the appearances extended over a forty-day period and
to over five hundred persons, “most of whom,” asserts Paul in
A.D. 56, “remain alive to the present” (Acts 1; 1 Corinthians
15).
Fifthly, the events of the last week of Jesus’ earthly life—his
trial, crucifixion, and burial—were events of high interest, and
they transpired in the public setting of the high Passover season
at Jerusalem: the public context would have made fabrication
an impossible task.
As Paul asserted when on trial for his faith, “These things were
not done in a corner” (Acts 26).
Efforts, such as those of Luedemann, to discount these historical considerations fail, and fail miserably:
We are told that “the visit of Mary Magdalene (with the two
other women) to the tomb of Jesus on the day after the Sabbath
can hardly be said to be historical. Historical enquiry must be
directed at the character of the underlying traditions.”
But there are no “underlying traditions”: the accounts of the
visits to the empty tomb and angelic encounters there are in the
same Gospel materials as every other fact about Jesus’ life, and
these are the earliest records which we possess; all references
to earlier “traditions” are entirely speculative.
Likwise we are told that “the tradition of the bribing of the
guards cannot be taken seriously. . . . The guards would have
been convicting themselves had they confessed that they had
slept at the tomb.”
But, as above, this account is an inherent part of the earliest textual material; and have we never encountered damning admissions by defendants or witnesses?
“The Thomas pericope represents, in terms of the early history
of the tradition, a late stage of the early Christian Easter stories,” asserts Luedemann.
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But not a scintilla of historical evidence exists to place the Thomas incident at “a late stage”: it appears in the earliest manuscripts of the Fourth Gospel and there are no variant texts
omitting it.
Luedemann informs us that Jesus’ “appearance before the
‘more than 500’ as a historical phenomenon can plausibly be
represented as mass ecstasy which took place in the early period of the community. Given the nature of mass psychology,
the stimulus towards it may have been provided by one or more
individuals.”
“Plausible”? Hardly. The critic attempts to practice psychology
without a license:
Granted that hypnotism has been found to produce testable
brain changes and is therefore a physiological reality (D.
Spiegel, AAAS, Boston, Feb. 2002), it is impossible to induce
the requisite hypnotic visions as crowd phenomena.
“Mass ecstasy” can hardly account for the detailed, individual
accounts of Jesus’ appearances, such as his eating entire meals
with those to whom he appeared and providing them with
lengthy interpretations of the Old Testament (Luke 24, etc.).
Had the entire gamut of post-resurrection appearances really
been nothing more than vague visions on the part of suggestible
disciples, would not the contemporaneous enemies of early
Christianity have exploited this to the full, thereby discrediting
the movement from the outset?
What of the critics’ contention that the resurrection accounts in
the Four Gospels are riddled with contradictions?
We reiterate that what a critic considers “contradictory” generally has no relation to logical contradiction; and that texts deserve to be given the benefit of the doubt.
One “ is often surprised to find how many apparent contradictions turn out not to be contradictory at all., but merely supplementary. Take, for example, the various accounts of the
Resurrection appearances at the Sepulchre. The divergences
appear very great on first sight. . . . But the fact remains that all
of them, without exception, can be made to fall into place in a
single orderly and coherent narrative without the smallest con-
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tradiction or difficulty, and without any suppression, invention,
or manipulation, beyond a trifling effort to imagine the natural
behaviour of a bunch of startled people running about in the
dawn light between Jerusalem and the Garden” (Dorothy Sayers, The Man Born to Be King).
If Jesus did not rise from the dead, one must explain the missing body from a sealed tomb on Easter morning—a tomb
guarded by a Roman patrol requested by the Jewish religious
leaders who wanted no rumors of resurrection to begin spreading.
“Most conclusively, it is impossible to imagine the earliest believers having any success whatsoever in their attempt to convince people that Jesus had been raised from the dead without
ungainsayable evidence of an empty tomb. Otherwise, their enemies could have refuted their testimony by simply producing
the body” (S. T. Davis).
What alternative explanations might be offered for the missing
body, and how effective would they be?
The Romans stole the body?
But this would have been against their own interest, since Roman policy was to quiet the Jewish religious unrest, not exacerbate it.
The Jewish religious leaders stole the body?
But they would have had far less reason than the Romans to do
so, and every reason not to do so, since it was their fervent desire to put an end to Jesus’ influence; indeed, it was they who
requested the Roman guard for the tomb.
Jesus’ disciples stole the body?
But had they done so, they would have subsequently died for
what they knew to be untrue, and we have no reason to think
that they were psychologically unbalanced.
People have often died for what was false, believing it to be
true; but to die for what one knows to be false is a psychological
aberration of the first order.
The body was stolen by persons unknown?
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But historical explanations must be backed up by facts, and
there are none whatsoever to support such a contention.
Legal reasoning arrives at the identical conclusion, for (as we
have seen) tribunals insist upon probability, based on evidence,
as the standard of proof—not mere speculative possibility.
Even less attention need be paid to such views as those of Von
Daniken (Chariots of the Gods), hypothesising that supernatural religious phenomena are to be accounted for by invasions of
advanced creatures from outer space.
In the complete absence of documentary evidence to support
this account of Jesus’ resurrection, one might as well believe
that Von Daniken himself is a space creature.
The same total absence of historical support should eliminate
from serious consideration those New Age claims that during
the “silent years” of Jesus’ life (prior to his three-year public
ministry) he traveled to India and fraternised with Eastern gurus; or that he married and had children.
“Of that which one cannot speak, one must remain silent”
(Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 7.0).
Having eliminated all other explanations of the missing body,
we conclude that the resurrection of Jesus—the explanation
presented by the primary-source witnesses—has been established “to a moral certainty, beyond reasonable doubt.”
As noted previously, this is the higher, criminal standard of
proof; it means (as in this instance) that the trier of fact must be
able rationally to exclude all other explanations of the crime
(here, the event) as being unsustainable by the facts in evidence.
An identical result is reached by the application of the legal
principle of Res ipsa loquitur.
This principle is chiefly employed in tort actions (e.g., patient
wakes up after an operation and discovers that his surgeon has
amputated the wrong leg; sues; and succeeds without the need
to provide empirical evidence of the surgeon’s negligence); Res
ipsa entails the following syllogism:
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(1) This kind of event does not normally occur in the absence
of negligence.
(2) The instrumentality in the instant case was under the defendant’s exclusive control.
(3) The plaintiff himself did not contribute to the injury.
∴ Defendant negligent: “the event speaks for itself.”
Applied to the resurrection of Christ:
(1) Dead bodies do not leave tombs in the absence of some
agency effecting their removal.
(2) If the tomb was under anyone’s exclusive control, it was
God’s, for it had been sealed, and Jesus, the sole occupant of it,
was dead.
(3) The Romans and the Jewish religious leaders did not contribute to the removal of the body (they had been responsible
for sealing and guarding the tomb to prevent anyone from stealing the body), and the disciples would not have stolen it, then
prevaricated, and finally died for what they knew to be untrue.
∴ Only God was in a position to empty the tomb, which he did,
by raising Jesus from the dead: “the event speaks for itself.”
Granted the force of all that has been said as to the soundness
of the testimony for Jesus’ resurrection and the inadequacy of
the attempts to explain it away on naturalistic grounds, does not
the mere fact that such an event would constitute a miracle
eliminate it from serious factual consideration?
Hume’s classic argument against the miraculous maintains, in
its strong form, that miracle evidence must always be discounted, since there is “uniform experience” against it.
That argument is a perfect instance of circular reasoning, for
the only way to determine whether in fact there is “uniform experience” against the miraculous is to evaluate testimony—and
the existence of serious testimonies to the resurrection of Christ
shows that such anti-miraculous testimony is not uniform.
It is a particular weakness in the traditional philosophical community to set forth arguments of this kind which would supposedly permit us to make valid declarations as to what is and what
is not the case without investigating the nature of things.
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Does this urge follow from a credulous belief that one has
found the Shangri-La of synthetic a priori? Or is it simply a
product of laziness, in not wanting to go to the trouble of investigating the world of fact?
“Somehow or other an extraordinary idea has arisen that the
disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly and fairly, while
believers in miracles accept them only in connection with some
dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly
or wrongly) because they have a doctrine against them” (G. K.
Chesterton).
The weaker form of Hume’s argument maintains that, since it
would always be “more miraculous” for the witness to a miracle not to have been mistaken, lying, or deceived than for the
miracle actually to have occurred, one should always “reject
the greater miracle.”
Archbishop Whately, in his delightful tour de force (Historic
Doubts Relative to Napoleon Buonaparte) applied Hume’s criteria to the remarkable, indeed unique, events of Napoleon’s
life, concluding that the evidence for them must be mistaken
and that Napoleon had never lived: after all, the French idolised
him and the English hated him, so neither the testimony of the
one nor that of the other could be relied upon (cf. C. Parton).
Insofar as the underlying assumption of the weaker form of
Hume’s argument is, again, the “uniformity of experience,” the
weaker argument falls along with the stronger.
Whenever we are asked to weigh a single, allegedly miraculous
event against the vast number of regular events and in consequence reject the miracle, we must observe the unstated assumption underlying that request: that all events are
interlocked in a nexus of regularity, such that the regular events
should influence the character of the whole; but that is exactly
what has not been proven—and cannot be proven in an open
universe where each event needs to be investigated without
prejudice.
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Insofar as Hume’s weaker argument is statistical in character
(the great number of regular, non-miraculous events should be
weighed against the rarity of unique claims), it should be noted
that statistics are of no value once an event has occurred (C. S.
Lewis).
It is overwhelmingly unlikely that I should meet a friend from
Chicago on the Paris Métro when both of us are on independent
holidays; yet one would be engaged in the height of foolishness
if one used statistics to assert that such an event did not take
place in spite of the undeniable empirical evidence in its behalf.
Exactly one year to the day after a van plunged down an embankment near Selby, England, causing a fatal crash with a
high speed train, a van did the very same thing near Lincoln,
England. “Government safety advisors stated this week that
disasters such as Selby were likely to happen only once every
350 years” (The Times, 1 March 2002). On the basis of the statistics, do we conclude that, in fact, the second accident never
occurred?
“You know, the most amazing thing happened to me tonight. I
was coming here, on the way to the lecture, and I came in
through the parking lot. And you won’t believe what happened. I saw a car with the license plate ARW 357. Can you
imagine? Of all the millions of license plates in the state, what
was the chance that I would see that particular one tonight?
Amazing!” (Richard P. Feynman).
Insofar as the Humean argument in both of its forms relies on
an absolutistic understanding of natural (i.e., physical) law, it
must be rejected.
Einsteinean relativity, whilst accepting Newtonian physics as a
satisfactory, pragmatic scheme for understanding a limited
range of phenomena, removes the possibility of considering it
as universally correct: the laws of the universe are not an invariable script, inscribed on the walls of the universe, by which we
can discount uniqueness, but our own generalisations based
upon observations of the phenomena of the world.
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Unique events must therefore be taken into account in the very
formulation of our scientific “laws,” and should always operate
to correct generalisations which are too rigid.
Thus, against the uniformitarian assumption of the 19th century
Periodic Table that the so-called “inert gases” could not enter
into chemical union with other elements to form compounds,
xenon tetrafluoride, xenon hexafluoroplatinate, and radon
compounds were produced in the laboratory, forcing a modification of the elegant generalisation represented by Mendeleev’s Table ( J Am Chem Soc 1962; 84: 3593; Proc Chem
Soc: 1962: 218).
It follows that, if one wishes to formulate laws concerning
death, the proper formulation, based on all the observational
evidence, should at least read: “People who die stay dead, with
one very important exception, namely Jesus Christ.”
Not without reason, the most comprehensive study to date of
Hume’s argument is entitled Hume’s Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles (J. Earman).
Equally noteworthy is D. Johnson’s devastating refutation:
Hume, Holism, and Miracles.
Antony Flew gives a new twist to the Humean approach in respect to the case for Jesus’ resurrection: granted (he argues)
that if the disciples stole the body and then preached the resurrection, knowing it to be false, and in consequence died for
what they knew to be untrue, that would constitute a psychological miracle; we should still prefer the latter to a biological
miracle (i.e., a de facto resurrection).
This argument is of course dependent on an unstated assumption of biological uniformitarianism—the Humean-Newtonian
absolute conception of physical law—as if Einsteinian relativity had never appeared on the scene.
Moreover, the argument contains a gratuitous, a priori preference for psychological uniqueness over biological uniqueness,
in defiance of the observational facts.
Whereas there is powerful first-hand testimony to a biological
miracle in the records of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances,
there is not a shred of evidence to support the “psychological
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miracle” of deranged disciples (e.g., a history of psychological
aberration on their part which would make likely their dying for
what they knew to be false).
But could it not be argued that, since by definition we do not
know what a miracle actually is, we cannot speak of it meaningfully and should avoid the use of it in historical explanation?
It is certainly true that we do not understand the mechanism of
the resurrection, or of miracles in general.
However, as we have seen, a proper scientific approach recognises facts even when we do not understand their workings and
even when they appear internally inconsistent (e.g., the waveparticle nature of Light).
If we admit to not understanding the miraculous, how can we
say that our ordinary methods of investigation could provide
sufficient reason for accepting a miracle? How could the ordinary standards of proof ever be sufficient?
Here, when treating Jesus’ resurrection, it is essential not to become enmeshed in the semantics of “miracle” or even of “resurrection”; instead, we must analyse the components.
A resurrection entails someone (Jesus) dead at point A and
alive at point B.
This sequence is indeed outside of our immediate experience.
We are, however, well acquainted with the sequence: alive at
point A and dead at point B—and we know how to distinguish
the one from the other,
Otherwise, we would be burying the wrong people.
Since we know how to establish that a given person is alive
(e.g., does he currently eat?) and that someone else is dead
(e.g., has he been effectively crucified?), we are in a position to
employ these tests though in reverse order.
What is critical epistemologically is not the order of applying
the tests, but the legitimacy of the tests themselves.
The standard of proof, therefore, is whatever normally satisfies
in deciding whether a subject is alive or dead.
“Suppose you saw a Man publickly executed, his Body afterwards wounded by the Executioner, and carry’d and laid in the
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Grave; that after this you shou’d be told, that the Man was
come to Life again: What wou’d you suspect in this Case? Not
that the Man had never been dead; for that you saw your self:
But you wou’d suspect whether he was now alive. But wou’d
you say, this Case excluded all human Testimony; and that
Men could not possibly discern, whether one with whom they
convers’d familiarly, was alive or no? Upon what Ground
cou’d you say this? A Man rising from the Grave is an Object
of Sense, and can give the same Evidence of his being alive, as
any other Man in the World can give. So that a Resurrection
consider’d only as a Fact to be proved by Evidence, is a plain
Case; it requires no greater Ability in the Witnesses, than that
they be able to distinguish between a Man dead, and a Man
alive: A Point, in which I believe every Man living thinks himself a Judge” (Thomas Sherlock, The Tryal of the Witnesses of
the Resurrection of Jesus [1729]).
3.67652 Those living in the 1st century were as capable as we today of
determining, in a case such as this, whether the appropriate
standard had been met.
3.676521 For the crucifixion team, this entailed driving a lance into Jesus’ side.
3.676522 For those involved in the entombment, it consisted of preparing
the body for burial in accordance with Jewish custom.
3.676523 For the witnesses to the post-resurrection appearances, it involved eating with Jesus, listening to him, and, after forty days,
watching him ascend physically into heaven.
3.67653 “He showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible
proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the
things pertaining to the kingdom of God. And . . . while they
beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their
sight” (Acts 1).
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The fact that Jesus himself, throughout his ministry, predicted
his resurrection from the dead adds even more weight to the
case that in his person the transcendent became immanent,
heaven touched earth, and the Word was indeed made flesh
(Matthew 12:40, 20:19; Mark 9:31, 10:34; Luke 18:33, 24:7;
John 2:19).
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We may rightly conclude, therefore, that when on the first
Easter morning Mary at the empty tomb thought at first that the
risen Jesus was the gardener (John 20), she was not entirely
mistaken: he was indeed the gardener of the Flew-Wisdom parable, come—not secretly at all—but openly and by many infallible proofs to “look after the garden which he loves.”
“On the third day the friends of Christ coming at daybreak to
the place found the grave empty and the stone rolled away. In
varying ways they realised the new wonder; but even they
hardly realised that the world had died in the night. What they
were looking at was the first day of a new creation, with a new
heaven and a new earth; and in a semblance of the gardener
God walked again in the garden, in the cool not of the evening
but the dawn” (G. K. Chesterton).
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The consequences of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead are
momentous: they include, inter alia: reasonable belief in the
other miracles he performed, acceptance of his claim to Deity,
a Trinitarian view of God, and a solid basis for revelational
truth.
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Jesus’ de facto resurrection renders pointless those perennial
attempts to explain away naturalistically the many miracles he
performed during his public ministry.
What, after all, is the value of a convoluted, gratuitous “explanation” of the miraculous feeding of the 5,000 (e.g., “The little
boy shamed the crowd, so they reluctantly produced the loaves
and fishes they had with them all the time”) when one cannot
account naturalistically for Jesus’ walking on water?
From Jesus’ resurrection from the dead we may properly accept
his claims to Deity.
Two possible sources of explanation, and two only, are available for Jesus’ resurrection once it has been established as a fact:
his own explanation or an explanation deriving from someone
else.
The great advantage to accepting Jesus’ own explanation is that
he, and he alone, had the experience; the overwhelming disadvantage to accepting the explanation of a third party is that that
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explanation will come from someone who certainly has not
risen from the dead.
Jesus’ explanation was that he is God almighty, come to earth
to die for the sins of the world, and that the resurrection is the
proof that he is the very person he claimed to be.
Since, presumably, God knows more about God’s nature than
anyone else, we can legitimately look to Jesus for whatever understanding of God may be possible for and available to us.
The reason for the highly unsatisfactory state of religious affirmations among the mutually contradictory religious systems of
the world may well be that those who have taken upon themselves the task of describing God, his nature and his work, have
been considerably less knowledgeable on those subjects than
God himself.
Water does not rise above its own level.
Jesus presents a Trinitarian view of God’s nature.
His Great Commission to his disciples, after his resurrection
and prior to his ascension into heaven, is thoroughly Trinitarian—“Go and baptise in the name [one name—singular noun]
of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
He declares: “I and the Father are one,” and “He who has seen
me has seen the Father.”
This creates an identity between Jesus and the God of the Old
Testament.
He also promises (John 14:16) that he will send the Holy
Spirit—“another Comforter,” the Greek referring to “another
of the same kind qualitatively (allos)” as himself, not “another
of a different kind” (heteros).
True, Jesus spoke Aramaic, not Greek; but since our primary
record of what he said is in Greek, we must suppose that the
writer, an eyewitness, recorded accurately in Greek what Jesus
had said in Aramaic.
Anything can be said in any language, though it may require
paraphrase and circumlocution: English does not possess all
the words for the different parts of a whale which exist in Es-
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kimo tongues, but the English speaker can certainly describe all
those parts of the whale, though it may take him a bit longer.
To reconstruct the words of Jesus—as do Aramaicists such as
Matthew Black—on the basis of hypothetical (deductive) conclusions from Aramaic vocabulary, syntax, and style, rather
than accepting inductively what the existing Greek sources tell
us Jesus said, is to replace the known by the unknown, and to
fall into a serious non sequitur.
To reason, not from the known to the unknown but from the unknown to the known, is to enter an asylum of ignorance.
In his teaching, therefore, Jesus identifies the Holy Spirit with
himself.
But if Jesus (the Son of God) = God the Father, and the Holy
Spirit = the divine Jesus, then the Holy Spirit also = God the Father.
Two things equal to the same thing are equal to each other.
At the same time, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are
presented as having distinct personalities and perform separate,
though often simultaneous, acts (e.g., at Jesus’ baptism); they
must therefore be considered separate Persons, united in one
Godhead.
It will be observed that the doctrine of the Trinity derives from
Jesus’ own understanding of himself, as presented in his own
teachings: it is simply not the case, as maintained by various
critics, that Trinitarian doctrine originated later as an incrustation of Greek philosophical ideas on the simple, uncomplicated, Jewish belief-system of the early Christians.
And if the objection is raised that such a picture of God is irrational because logically inconsistent, we remind the objector
that facts trump our inability to fit the world into neat, consistent compartments—as illustrated scientifically by the Photon.
Moreover, whilst 1 + 1 + 1 ≠ 1, 1 x 1 x 1 = 1.
The philosophical importance of Trinitarian doctrine (three
Persons in one Godhead) is often overlooked: if God is indeed
love, and has always been so (even before he created other persons), he would have to be more than monopersonal.
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The only alternatives for a unitarian God would be (1) in his essential nature he is not love, or (2) his “love” was first and most
fundamentally manifested in self-centredness—for prior to creating other persons it could only have been directed at himself.
Aristotle’s Deity was of the latter sort, spending eternity loving
himself, since no other object of love could be equally worthy
of his attention.
“Even if God exists, yet is of such a nature that he feels no benevolence or affection towards men, good-bye to him, say I.
Why should I say ‘God be gracious to me’?—since he cannot
be gracious to anybody” (Cicero, De natura deorum).
But why must we accept as true the statements of Jesus, simply
because he is God?
The biblical God and his Son Jesus Christ continually present
themselves as “the God of truth”: but could that in itself be a
lie?
To the possibility raised by Descartes that God could be a consummate liar, we need only point out the analytical meaninglessness of the idea.
Were God a liar, he would be the best of all possible liars, and
humans would never be able to catch him out; thus there would
never be a way of confirming or disconfirming his mendacity.
Why must we conclude that Jesus is God just because he conquered the power of death?
The resurrection of Jesus is a sufficient ground for accepting
Jesus’ Deity, not just because it is a miracle but because this
particular miracle deals effectively with the most fundamental
area of mankind’s universal need, the conquest of death.
We do not argue that the performance of any miracle would
perforce justify belief in the Deity of the one performing it; we
argue that Jesus’ conquest of death is a miracle of a special
character, properly implicating his Deity for the human race.
Contrast the East Indian “rope miracles” and walking unhurt on
live coals.
Contrast also computer “god-game” miracles, e.g., in Black &
White Creature Isle: the Fireball (it “can quickly become one
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of a god’s main weapons—so much damage from such a tiny
ball of flame. . . . It causes collateral damage, setting alight anything made of wood that it comes into contact with: houses,
civic buildings, whole forests, etc.”); the Enlarge (“the sheer
size of your Creature can gain Belief from any villagers who
see it—the bigger the Creature, the larger the Belief”); the
Winged Creatures (“a pretty spell, designed purely to impress
a village’s inhabitants and to gain Belief in large, desirable
chunks. Once charged, the Winged Creatures Miracle releases
a flight of doves (good alignment) or bats (evil alignment) from
the casting point”).
Psychologists tell us that we are at all times conscious of our
own demise; existentialist philosophers argue that the meaning
of life can only be found when we face the reality of our own
mortality.
The “dying declaration” exception to the hearsay rule points to
this truth: the law admits into evidence even the declaration of
the homicide victim without religious faith—on the ground that
one is particularly likely to tell the truth when conscious of the
immanence of that most terrible of existential events.
Jesus promised eternal life to all who come to him to receive it;
says he: “I am the resurrection, and the life: he who believes in
me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whoever lives
and believes in me shall never die.”
It follows that not to worship One who gives you the gift of
eternal life is hopelessly to misread what the gift tells you about
the Giver.
Jesus’ Deity compels the acceptance of whatever he has said,
and on any subject.
His statements on computer programming would be definitive,
had he made any; but apart from his use of the law of contradiction, fundamental to binary computer language, he does not
appear to have touched on the matter (which goes far to explain
computer crashes).
What Jesus did speak about was the way of salvation. He declared:
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That every human being lacks the moral perfection required by
a Holy God, is self-centred in his dealing with his fellows, and
can only enter again into fellowship and communion with God
by personal salvation.
That salvation is available only through Jesus, by way of accepting his death on the cross as sacrifice for our sins.
That refusal to accept him is refusal of the love of God and has
eternal consequences.
That receiving his forgiveness is the gate to a new, changed life
here and the assurance of everlasting personal fellowship with
God.
Might not Jesus’ views of the religious subjects on which he
spoke have nonetheless been coloured by the very fact of his
Incarnation and therefore limited to the knowledge of his time?
This suggestion is generally designated by its advocates the
Kenotic theory, according to which Jesus either unknowingly
was limited, or knowingly limited himself, to the thoughtforms of his day.
Kenotic theory takes its name from the Greek word for “emptying” in Philippians 2:6-8, but that passage makes no reference
to an alleged fallibility on Jesus’ part.
The Kenotic view, though sometimes flirted with by liberal
evangelical theologians, is generally promoted by biblical critics within the church who wish to maintain an official commitment to Jesus’ Deity whilst not being compelled to accept as
revelatory certain of his views, such as his emphasis on his
atoning, substitutionary death or his unqualified acceptance of
the Old Testament.
This may, rather unkindly, be seen as an effort to have one’s
cake and eat it too.
In a single instance, Jesus indeed admits that he does not know
something (the hour of his second coming). But:
Only an item of eschatological knowledge is involved (and, according to Jesus, that information was withheld by divine fiat);
and
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Jesus’ disclaimer of knowledge on this point shows that in his
incarnate state he was nonetheless fully aware of the boundaries of his knowledge.
Being in control of his knowledge, he would not have advertently or inadvertently given false or misleading information
when he did make positive assertions (e.g., on the reliability of
the Bible).
Had Jesus purposely given incorrect teaching in order to accommodate to the views of his time, he would have committed
the basic moral fault of letting the end justify the means
(thereby placing himself in the same category with such towering ethical figures as Lenin, Lukács, and Joseph Fletcher).
But the mere fact that Jesus’ never flinched in uttering messages which infuriated his religious contemporaries removes
all plausibility from such a claim.
If Jesus could not help giving false information (owing to the
exigencies of Incarnation), then
Incarnation would lose all meaning, since not a single word of
what he taught could necessarily be regarded as more than a
fallible matter of human opinion.
Indeed, Strack and Billerbeck have shown that a great deal of
the individual remarks of Jesus can be paralleled in Jewish literature of the intertestamental period: would it therefore follow
that virtually all of Jesus’ teachings were accommodations to
the spirit of the age, and not divinely mandated revelation?
If Jesus’ teaching consists of a combination of genuine revelation and mere human, fallible opinion (to which he accommodated himself or could not help but accept, owing to his taking
on human flesh), we would never be able to identify which portion was which.
In the absence of a higher (absolute) criterion by which to make
the judgment, we could not arrive at a satisfactory separation of
the wheat from the chaff—and such a criterion would have to
come from an unqualified, non-kenotic revelation (precisely
what the Kenotic theory excludes).
The solution of the kenoticist, to be sure, is to reject as the product of human limitation whatever in Jesus’ teaching makes her
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feel uncomfortable, or whatever does not seem to fit modern,
contemporary beliefs.
Where this kind of reasoning is employed, we have a classic instance of creating God in one’s own image.
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The matter of God’s existence now warrants our philosophical and scientific attention.
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Nothing has been said to this point concerning philosophical or
scientific proofs of Theism; is this not a fatal lacuna in our demonstration?
Yes, say the neo-Thomists and the so-called classical theists,
who insist that an independent theistic structure must be established to make sense of Jesus’ claims to Deity and to give probative force to his resurrection.
We disagree: one does not need such a structure to understand
what Jesus meant in claiming divinity for himself or to appreciate the force of the argument for the significance of his resurrection.
When asked “Show us the Father,” Jesus simply pointed to
himself, declaring: “He who has seen me, has seen the Father.”
This is an inductive argument based on factual considerations
within the purview of the questioner.
That this was Jesus’ approach in general can be seen in his response to disciples of John who asked, “Are you the promised
one, or should we look for another?,” and Jesus answered: “Go
and show John again those things which you hear and see: the
blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are
cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor
have the gospel preached to them. And blessed is he, whoever
shall not be offended in me.”
Indeed, this approach has great philosophical merit, since it relies, not on a descriptive attempt to define and justify Deity
(subject, as are all descriptive definitions, to an infinite number
of sub-definitions), but on a denotative identification: “By
God, we mean, in the first instance, the Jesus to whom the primary witnesses point. He will be glad to give you a fuller picture of Deity if you are willing to listen to him.”
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Only if there is Incarnation—only if God became man—will a
denotative treatment of him be possible.
Technically, descriptive definition can never be exhaustive,
since all facts are interconnected and fully to explain one would
require an explanation of all the rest.
Even more importantly, persons always transcend descriptive
definition.
Since God is personal, and the philosophies and non-Christian
religions of the world cannot appeal to an Incarnation, they are
forced to descriptive definitions of Deity—which may be a significant factor in the inadequacy of their results.
This is not to say that all philosophical and scientific arguments
for God’s existence are fallacious; quite the contrary.
Some, however, are, such as the classic, Anselmian ontological
argument.
That argument asserts:
(1) God is than which no greater exists.
(2) In consequence, God possesses all properties.
(3) Existence is a property.
∴ God exists.
The fallacy of this argument is to suppose that “existence” is a
property lying alongside other properties such as “colour,”
“size,” or “weight”; but if one removes all the genuine properties from something, one does not find that existence remains:
existence is the name we give to something that has properties.
Gödel's more sophisticated, modern form of the ontological argument likewise suffers from overwhelming difficulties: Sobel
has shown that “given the terms and conditions of the system,
no being that possessed all positive properties could reasonably
be maintained to be God” and that “there is a collapse of modalities in the system —that in it everything that is actual or
true is so of logical necessity” (J. H. Sobel, in J. J. Thomson's
On Being and Saying, Essays for R. Cartwright [1987]).
But Norman Malcolm has a genuine point in his soteriological
variant on the ontological argument—that as members of a
fallen race we may well experience a guilt beyond all measure,
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a guilt “than which a greater cannot be conceived”; this, in turn,
can lead to the conviction that there is indeed a Forgiveness beyond all measure, a forgiving mercy “than which no greater can
be conceived.” (Philosophical Rev., January 1960).
The traditional, Aristotelian-Thomistic proofs for God’s existence have serious problems, as Kant and many others have
pointed out.
Inter alia, these proofs deal with single aspects of God’s nature
and of the cosmos, and do not necessarily lead to the desired
Transcendent Absolute.
The argument from Motion (everything that moves requires a
mover; the cosmos therefore requires a Prime Mover) might
lead us only to a Divine Billiard Player who first “breaks.”
William Paley’s stress on the complexity of the human eye as
an illustration of the argument from Design might only bring
the unbeliever into philosophical contact with a Cosmic Opthomologist.
Even if such problems are overcome, the proofs, at best, take
one only to a Creator God, not necessarily to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The philosophical case for God’s existence is best made by way
of the Contingency argument, which employs the underlying,
foundational principle of the traditional theistic arguments,
namely
Contingent Æ Absolute.
That argument may be formulated thusly:
(1) Nothing in the world can explain itself.
(2) The world is the sum total of everything in it.
(3) ∴The world as a whole is contingent, requiring an explanation beyond itself, i.e., a transcendent God.
(4) That transcendent God must either be absolute (non-contingent) or himself require explanation.
(5) If contingent, a higher-level Deity will be required to explain him, and so on, ad infinitum, producing an infinite series
(where W = the contingent world, and G = God):
W Æ G Æ G2 Æ G3 ... Gn-3Æ Gn-2 Æ Gn-1 Æ Gn
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(6) But since an infinite series, by definition, has no end, there
will be no explanation for any Deity prior to Gn, and the world
itself will remain without explanation, and
(7) ∴ An absolute, non-contingent, existent God must be regarded as the final explanation of the contingent world.
But why do we need to bother with an “explanation” for the
world? Why not just be satisfied with the world as it is?
To take this route is, in effect, to deny the contingent nature of
the world and mythologically make it absolute—in the face of
all empirical knowledge of its non-self-explanatory character.
But who created the absolute God?
A nonsensical question, since, ex hypothesi, whatever is absolute does not require explanation; if it did, it would not be absolute but contingent.
We seek an explanation for the world, for it is demonstrably
contingent (consisting, as it does, of nothing but contingent,
non-self-explanatory things); but there is no evidence to suggest that God is contingent.
What is the nature of the Absolute God of the Contingency argument?
Is he rational? Doubtless, since we, as his rational creatures,
have employed a rational proof to arrive at his existence.
Indeed, as the Logos—the “Word” (Jn. 1)--God may properly
be described as “la source première de l’information créatrice”
(C. Tresmontant).
Is he (it?) personal? Doubtless, since in our human experience—pace doctrinaire evolutionists—personality does not
arise from the impersonal, and the existence of personhood is
one of the contingencies requiring an appeal to a transcendent
Absolute.
Is he a moral Deity? Doubtless, for one must account for the
fact that no human society functions without an ethical code of
some sort (C. S. Lewis); however, this brings us only to a Divinity who justifies value-systems as such, not to a Deity supporting any particular moral or ethical position—the human
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landscape displaying a plethora of competing ethical viewpoints.
Beyond this, it seems that we cannot go in characterising the
Absolute: apart from a special revelation from God setting
forth his character, his moral standards, and what he expects of
us, we remain in darkness.
That arguments for an Absolute—even the most powerful—do
not necessarily carry one to the God of Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob or to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is evident from
the recent “conversion” of atheist Antony Flew; Flew now describes himself as “a deist like Thomas Jefferson, whose God
was not actively involved in people's lives.”
Scientific evidence for the existence of a Divine Creator is
powerfully compelling.
When atheist Richard Dawkins begins his book, The Blind
Watchmaker, with the assertion, “Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose,” one is reminded of the old adage, “If it
looks like a duck, smells like a duck, quacks like a duck, and
tastes like canard à l’orange, chances are it is not a qumquat.”
The argument that, given an infinite length of time, any physical or biological development would be possible without a Creator constitutes an asylum of ignorance.
Huxley’s notion that monkeys typing at random long enough
will eventually produce literature (“the works of Shakespeare”)
has been tested at Plymouth University, England: over time,
the monkeys (1) attacked their computer, (2) urinated on it, and
(3) failed to produce a single word (AP dispatch, 9 May 2003).
Cf. Angus Menuge, Agents Under Fire.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics—a foundation stone of
modern physics and engineering science—supports the Contingency argument.
That Law declares that in closed systems (systems not receiving energy from an outside source), the entropic process will
result in “heat death” in a finite time, i.e., a point will be
reached in a finite period when there will be no “workable” energy any longer available.
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Were the atheist to be right, the universe would already have
reached heat death, since for the atheist the universe is necessarily a closed system (there is no God to feed energy into it),
and it has been around for an infinite time (since there is no God
to have created it)—and all finite times are swallowed up in an
infinite time.
The Second Law, properly applied, requires either that the universe came into existence a finite time ago (its not yet having
reached heat death) or that there is a Cosmic Petrol-station
Owner outside of it feeding energy in to sustain it (what the theologians call Creatio continua)—or both; what is not possible
is a universe devoid of a transcendent explanation for its energy
conditions.
One evidence that the universe has not already reached heat
death is the fact that we still possess the energy to discuss this
question.
It does not help the atheist to suggest that perhaps the present
universe is the product of a prior universe, since (1) the issue is
the energy conditions of all such universes, not any one of
them; (2) there is no positive evidence of a succession of universes, nor presumably could there be, since the conditions of
scientific investigation are necessarily limited to the universe
in which the investigator currently finds herself; and (3) any
“succession of universes” argument falls under the axe of the
infinite series fallacy, discussed above.
It is likewise of no assistance to appeal to a “Big Bang”: it will
still be incumbent upon us to identify the “Banger.”
If the Bang in question derived from a prior world, we have no
choice but to treat its energy conditions by way of the Second
Law (leaving us in the same position as when a Bang is not postulated); if it is assumed to be an Absolute, non-contingent
Bang, we arrive at the very God to which the Contingency argument points.
If the cosmologist thinks the way out of the difficulty lies in an
oscillating, cyclical universe (A. Friedmann, N. Turok, P.
Steinhardt, J. Khoury, B. Ovrut), she is mistaken: the issue
(again) is not the energy conditions in a part of the whole—
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here, one phase of the alleged oscillation—but the energy situation in the universe in its entirety, oscillations included.
3.86261 A college student receives a fixed amount of money for the finite school year (her economic situation is a “closed universe,”
since Daddy will not pay one penny beyond that amount); she
then creates two (oscillating) bank accounts, so that she can
watch the money grow in one of them, as it is transferred from
the other; query: does this prevent the monetary equivalent of
heat death following the entropic drop in her funds due to overspending?
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The Second Law leads most astronomers and astrophysicists to
postulate a finite universe.
3.86271 Isaac Asimov (Astronomy) estimates its radius (“Hubble radius”) at 12,000,000,000 light-years.
3.862711 His calculation, it is true, may be off by a few kilometres.
3.862712 However, a radius requires a circumference—a boundary; and
a boundary means, logically, something (Someone?) beyond it.
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“The author has found that the second law tends to increase his
conviction that there is a Creator who has the answer for the future destiny of man and the universe” (Van Wylen, Thermodynamics [John Wiley]).
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Steller phenomena provide further evidence of contingency
and the need to posit a finite universe requiring a transcendent
Creator.
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Olbers’ Paradox can only be taken seriously if the universe is
finite; that paradox, recognised since ancient Greek times but
often ignored by secular thinkers, recognises that if there were
in fact an infinite number of stars distributed evenly in infinite
space, the consequence would be a sky blazing all over with extraordinary brilliance; this, however, is in clear contradiction to
the factual darkness of the night sky. Conclusion: space is not
infinite, nor is the number of stars infinite (Jaki).
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“Intelligent design” is powerfully supported by empirical evidence.
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The presence of intelligent design may validly be detected by
“specified complexity.”
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“Complexity guarantees that the object in question is not so
simple that it can readily be attributed to chance. Specification
guarantees that the object exhibits the right sort of pattern associated with intelligent causes. A single letter of the alphabet is
specified without being complex. A long sequence of random
letters is complex without being specified. A Shakespearean
sonnet is both complex and specified. Specified complexity is
how we detect design empirically” (Dembski).
Considerably lacking in these requisites was the “Holy Tomato” apologetic design claim made in 1999 by a Muslim Pakistani woman living in Bradford, England: she found a tomato
whose vein structure presented an Arabic inscription reading
“There is no god but Allah.”
A highly significant positive illustration is that of the “fine tuning” of the universe: were it not for six highly specific constants, our universe could not exist as it is (Martin Rees).
These constants include: the N-factor (the strength of the electrical forces holding atoms together divided by the force of
gravity between them: 1 followed by 36 zeros): if even one zero
were missing, only a short-lived miniature universe could exist;
the ∈-constant, 0.007, defining how firmly atomic nuclei bind
together (if this were 0.006 or 0.008, our existence would be
impossible); the Ω-number determines the expansion energy in
the universe (were it higher than it is, the universe would have
collapsed long ago; were it lower, no stars or galaxies would
have formed); λ, the cosmic antigravity force, has to be as
small as it is, or galaxies and stars would have been prevented
from forming; the Q-constant, about 1/100,000, represents the
ratio of two fundamental energies (if smaller, the universe
would be inert and structureless; if larger, the universe would
be dominated by black holes and so violent that solar systems
could not survive); and the D-factor: our universe consists of
three physical dimensions, no more, no less.
The field of “chaotic dynamics” has shown that “almost all of
the everyday physical world is so exquisitely sensitive that the
smallest disturbance produces quite uncontrollable and unpredictable consequences” (J. Polkinghorne, opposing a mecha-
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nistic, deterministic view of the universe and offering evidence
for an open cosmos in which prayer is meaningful).
The precision so manifested makes exceedingly difficult the
atheistic claim that ours is a universe which arose by random
chance.
“If you see a spacious and beautiful house, you could not be induced to believe, even though you could not see its master, that
it was built by mice and weasels. . . . I cannot understand why
he who considers it possible for this to have occurred [by
chance] should not also think that, if a countless number of copies of the one-and-twenty letters of the alphabet, made of gold
or what you will, were thrown together into some receptacle
and then shaken out on to the ground, it would be possible that
they should produce the Annals of Ennius, all ready for the
reader. I doubt whether chance could possibly succeed in producing even a single verse!” (Cicero, De natura deorum).
There are irreducibly complex biochemical systems, such as
the bacterial flagellum, which cannot be accounted for by evolutionary development, since they are at the very beginning of
biological life; the “engineering” manifested by these biochemical systems cries out for an intelligent Designer (Michael
Behe; Michael Denton).
The flagellum has functional elements satisfactorily accountable only from the hypothesis of an intelligent Designer: a universal joint (hook), a propeller (filament), L-ring and P-ring
bushings, a stator (C-ring and studs), a drive shaft (rod), and a
rotor (S- and M-rings).
The physical brain is insufficient to account for the existence of
the human mind; here, again, contingency requires a transcendent explanation.
“It can be asserted that I have my experienced uniqueness because my brain is built by the genetic instructions of a quite
unique genetic code, my genome with its 30,000 or so genes
(Dobzhansky, personal communication) strung along the immense double helix of the human DNA with its 3.5 X 109 nucleotide pairs. It has to be recognised that with 30,000 genes
there is a chance of 1010,000 against that uniqueness being
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achieved. That is, if my uniqueness of self is tied to the genetic
uniqueness that built my brain, then the odds against myself existing in my experienced uniqueness are 1010,000 against” (Sir
John Eccles, in Popper and Eccles, The Self and Its Brain).
These evidences of intelligent design hardly suffer from the illogic of Voltaire’s sarcastic proof of Theism: “God made our
noses so that they would fit glasses.”
So persuasive is the argument from intelligent design that it has
recently convinced philosopher Antony Flew to move from
atheism to deism.
“The fool hath said in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Ps. 14 and
53).
Those who argue that the scientific evidences just described
should not be presented in secular schools because to do so is
nothing more than disguised religious proselytising only display their own prejudices: if hard science leads to theological
conclusions, this in no way alters the facticity of the data or the
scientific character of the investigation.
Interestingly enough, the same secularists have never worried
about the legal or philosophical implications of teaching scientific data—or even philosophical (e.g., evolutionary) speculations—which allegedly support their own atheistic or agnostic
views of the universe.
“It is absurd for the Evolutionist to complain that it is unthinkable for an admittedly unthinkable God to make everything out
of nothing, and then pretend that it is more thinkable that nothing should turn itself into everything” (G. K. Chesterton).
We now see that, with all its limitations, the evidence supplied
by what has been traditionally called “natural theology” is very
powerful in supporting the existence of a transcendent God and
in underscoring the meaningfulness of Jesus’ historically attested claim to Divinity.
This is true whether one turns a philosophical or a scientific
spotlight on that which is the case.
Such arguments present in other terms what is stated theologically in Romans 1: “The invisible things of him from the crea-
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tion of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the
things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.”
Interlocking natural theology and the historical case for Jesus’
resurrection by way of Bayes’s theorem of probability calculus
leads to the conclusion that the probability of the de facto occurrence of Jesus’ resurrection is “something of the order of
97%” (R. Swinburne).
Bayes’s theorem asserts that the probability of an hypothesis h
(here, the facticity of Jesus’ resurrection), given evidence e, is
the initial or prior probability of h, multiplied by the probability
of e given h, divided by the prior probability of the evidence e
(cf. J. Earman). Expressed as a formula, Pr(H/E&B) = [Pr(H/B)
x Pr(E/H&B)] / Pr (E/B), where H is the hypothesis, B is background knowledge (here, natural theology) and E is the evidence acquired by observation (here, the historical case for
Jesus’ resurrection). Confirmation of the hypothesis occurs,
then, insofar as (1) we would expect E to be present if H is true,
given B; (2) we would expect H to be true on background evidence alone; and (3) we would not expect to find E unless H
were true.
“If you agree with me that the coincidence of the evidence we
have of the satisfaction of the prior and posterior requirements
is (barring divine intervention) very very improbable, and the
evidence of their coincidence (if God intervened to become incarnate and to rise from the dead) only very improbable, it follows that it is very probable that Jesus rose from the dead, and
also that he was God Incarnate—which is enough reason to
suppose that he speaks to us through Scripture” (Swinburne).
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Some truths make no demands upon us (“James Buchanan
was 15th President of the United States”); others very definitely do (“God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto
himself”).
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Can personal decisions required by the case for Jesus Christ not
be postponed on the ground that that case is, after all, empirical
in nature and therefore always subject to possible revision
based on the discovery of new facts?
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The evidence for Jesus’ Lordship, based chiefly on his resurrection from the dead, has been available for two thousand
years; the likelihood of finding the body of Christ today is infinitesimal.
Would we consider rational a refusal to purchase an album of
the “Complete Songs of Elvis Presley” because there is always
the possibility that he is indeed still alive and may be recording
new songs in the future?
Can a response to the claims of Christ be postponed on the
ground that the case presented is not 100% certain and therefore agnosticism is more reasonable than belief?
Would we consider it reasonable to refuse to put money into
U.S. government bonds because 100% assurance cannot be
provided that the country might not go bankrupt sometime in
the future?
As the existentialists have correctly emphasised, all life is decision, and when one refuses to make a decision, that in itself is
a decision.
The real issue in agnosticism is, then: Does better evidence exist in favour of not making a decision for Jesus Christ than for
making such a decision? Everything presented to this point
should decisively answer that question.
But surely many great thinkers have not gone this route? True;
though the best of them have wished they could—from Plato to
Wittgenstein.
“With respect to such matters, it seems to me, and perhaps also
to you, Socrates, that it is either impossible or very difficult to
arrive at certainty in the present life; yet at the same time that a
man shows very great weakness if he ceases to examine in
every way what is said concerning these matters while he is still
able to do so. For with regard to such things it is necessary to
do one of the following: either learn from others or discover
yourself how they stand, or, if this is impossible, lay hold on the
very best and most irrefutable of human reasonings, and, having embarked on this, sail through life as one who risks himself
upon a raft, unless a safer and less hazardous passage is possi-
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ble in a more secure conveyance, to wit, some word of God”
(Phaedo, 85d; our translation).
“Often as we walked together he would stop and exclaim ‘Oh,
my God!,’ looking at me almost piteously, as if imploring a divine intervention in human events” (Malcolm, speaking of
Wittgenstein).
The evidence for the reality of the “secure conveyance” and for
the facticity of the “intervention” is solid, and their benefits extraordinary.
“O King, this present life of men on earth, in comparison with
the time that is unknown to us, seems to me as if you were sitting at a banquet with your ealdormen and thanes in the winter
time with the fire burning and the hall warmed, and outside the
storms of winter rain or snow were raging; and there should
come a sparrow swiftly flying through the hall, coming in by
one door and flying out through another. During the time it is
inside it is not touched by the storm of winter; but, that little
moment of quiet having passed, it soon returns from winter
back to winter again, and is lost to sight. So this mortal life
seems like a short interval; what may have gone before or what
may come after it, we do not know. Therefore. if this new
teaching has brought any greater certainty, it seems fitting that
it should be followed” (Bede, H.E., ii.13, recounting the argument that converted the 7th century Northumbrians to Christian
faith).
If the case for Jesus Christ is as strong as it is, then one should
consider the consequences both of acceptance and of rejection.
We are told that, ultimately, “at the name of Jesus every knee
should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things
under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians
2:10; cf. Romans 14:11; Isaiah 45:23).
One does not, in the final analysis, have a choice between either
confessing Christ or not confessing him; the choice is between
doing it now, to one’s benefit, or doing it at the last judgment,
unwillingly, and to one’s eternal loss.
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Thus the force of Pascal’s wager, which asks: Suppose the evidence were exactly balanced for and against the truth of Christianity, what would you gain and what would you lose by
accepting Christ as Saviour?
If Christianity were false, and you accept it, you still benefit by
gaining the highest moral code and following the finest moral
example in human history.
If, however, Christianity is true, and you reject it, you lose your
soul.
And we have seen that the evidence is by no means equally balanced for and against the veracity of Christ’s claims; the truth
of his assertion to be God almighty, come to save us from our
sins, is compelling to a moral certainty, beyond reasonable
doubt.
“Belief does not aim merely at truth; it aims at knowledge. The
more it is justified by knowledge, the closer it comes to knowledge itself. If evidence and knowledge are one, then the more a
belief is justified by evidence, the closer it comes to its aim” (T.
Williamson).
Jesus’ probing questions thus arrive at our door, and there is no
rational way of avoiding them: “What do you think of Christ?”
“But who do you say that I am?”
“From no necessity [He] / Condescended to exist and to suffer
death / And, scorned on a scaffold, ensconced in His life / The
human household. In our anguish we struggle / To elude Him,
to lie to Him, yet His love observes / His appalling promise; His
predilection / As we wander and weep is with us to the end”
(W. H. Auden).
4
The historical validation of the Christian faith yields an
inerrant, perspicuous and univocal written revelation.
4.1
The presence of fulfilled prophecies in the Bible supports the
hypothesis that it is the product of divine revelation and not a
collection of books merely of human origin.
4.11
To be sure, for prophetic evidence to be compelling, the prophecies need to be highly specific and non-ambiguous.
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They must not be in the nature of the pronouncements of the
Delphic oracle, who declared on one occasion when her advice
was sought that “the army to cross the river on the way to battle
would win” (but both armies had to do so to reach the battlefield).
Nor can they be of the kind represented by the quatrains of Nostradamus, where competent interpreters have come to irresolvable, mutually contradictory positions as to their meaning.
Nor can they be so trivial and limited in character that they
could be accounted for either by human inference from known
events in the past or present, or by a seer’s extrasensory “tuning
in” on other human minds.
The biblical prophecies are not subject to these difficulties (cf.
J. Barton Payne, Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy); examples:
The future of the twin cities of Tyre and Sidon (the former to
be utterly destroyed with its stones and dust laid in the sea; the
latter to continue—Ezekiel 26 and 28), confirmed by secular
history (J. Urquhart; R. C. Newman).
The multitude of prophecies of the coming of Messiah—prophecies interspersed throughout the Old Testament books (A.
Keith; E. A. Edghill); for example:
Daniel’s prophecy of the “seventy weeks” (Daniel 9), offering
a precise chronological prediction of the date of commencement of Jesus’ public ministry (cf. Sir Robert Anderson, The
Coming Prince).
The Messiah’s lineage through the tribe of Judah and King
David (Genesis 49 and Isaiah 9).
His birth in the little village of Bethlehem (Micah 5; cf. Sir W.
Ramsay, Was Christ Born at Bethlehem?).
His birth to a Virgin (Isaiah 7).
A modern English translation of the Isaiah prophecy, such as
the RSV, which substitutes “young woman” for “virgin,” does
violence to the original text—since well before the Christian
era the Jews themselves, in translating from Hebrew to Greek
(the Septuagint, produced in Alexandria, 300-100 B.C.), em-
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ployed the Greek parthenos to translate the Hebrew almah;
parthenos means “virgin,” not merely a young woman.
The massacre of infants at his birth and his flight into Egypt
(Jeremiah 31 and Hosea 11).
His betrayal for thirty pieces of silver and the money used to
buy a potter’s field (Zechariah 11).
The force of the Messianic prophecies can be specified mathematically, employing the statistician’s “product rule.”
The product rule states that the probability of the common occurrence of several mutually independent events is equal to the
product of the probabilities that each of those given events will
happen, i.e., if the probability of one event’s occurring is l/x,
the probability of a number of similar but mutually independent
events will be l/.xn , where n = the number of events.
If one arbitrarily sets the probability of the occurrence of a single valid Old Testament prophecy of Christ at 50-50 (1/2), then
the probabilities against twenty-five of them happening by
chance is 1/225, or 1 in 33 million. But since the likelihood of
any one of these prophecies succeeding is considerably less
than 50-50 ("Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son,”
etc.), we can legitimately lower the probability of one occurrence to 25 percent (1/4). The probability against 25 similar
events transpiring by chance would then be 1/425, or 1 in a
thousand trillion.
“Since there are many more than 25 prophecies of events surrounding the birth and life of Christ, and a compromise chance
of success is undoubtedly less than 1 to 4, then the chance of
success, if these predictions were all mere guesses, would be so
infinitesimal that no one could maintain that these prophecies
were mere guesses! The alternative must be true—these prophecies were all foreseen events, in which ‘holy men of God spake
as tbey were moved by the Holy Ghost.’ The prophecies were
given by revelation—divinely inspired” (H. O. Taylor).
Can it be said that this application of the product rule is improper, owing to the fact that the rule should only be applied to
“mutually independent” events? No, for
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The prophecies of the Old Testament are indeed mutually independent, in that they were set out by diverse authors at diverse
times, and their fulfilments were recorded by more than one
Gospel writer.
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But are we not assigning an arbitrary value for the probability
of the occurrence of any one prophecy?
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We are indeed, but the values we assign are exceedingly conservative: ours is the a fortiori position that even if the likelihood of the success of a single prophecy were but 50 percent or
25 percent, the conclusion would be inescapable that the totality of fulfillments must not be attributed to chance.
4.136
Is it not logically the case—since probability reasoning does
not in itself establish causation—that the “success” of what we
have regarded as predictions could be due, not to divine inspiration but to (1) Jesus having conformed his life to the prophecies to “make” them come true, and/or (2) the New Testament
writers having “fudged” the life of Christ to fit the Old Testament prophecies?
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These arguments face overwhelming difficulties:
4.13611 As for Jesus’ making his life fit the prophecies, he might have
been responsible personally for the fulfillment of Messianic
prophecy when he said on the cross, “My God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me?,” but he could hardly have set up the
time, place, and manner of his own birth, the number of pieces
of silver for which he would be sold, etc.
4.13612 As for the Gospel writers’ making the life of Jesus fit the prophecies, had these writers altered the facts of Jesus’ life to accord
with Old Testament predictions, they could never have gotten
away with it.
4.136121 We have already stressed that the preaching of the facts of
Christ’s life, death, and resurrection, as well as the circulation
of the Gospel narratives of these events, took place while hostile witnesses of Jesus’ career were still alive (the very Jewish
religious leaders who had brought about his demise); it is unthinkable that they would not have easily refuted such claims to
fulfilled prophecy when (a) they knew the Old Testament and
(b) they knew the actual facts of Jesus’ life.
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4.15
The presence of statistically significant numbers of highly specific prophecies across the span of the Old Testament which
come to concrete fulfillment in the New lends powerful support
to the contention that the Bible is a collection of books having
a divinely revelatory character.
And since the most significant of those prophecies, both quantitatively and quantitatively, refer to Jesus Christ himself, they
also provide powerful reinforcement to the case for his Divinity.
4.2
It has already been pointed out that Jesus’ attested claims to
Deity establish the truth of what he said; this principle will
now be applied to the concrete issue of the extent of biblical
authority—beginning with the Old Testament.
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We shall first ask: What was Jesus’ view of the Old Testament?
It cannot be stressed too strongly that, following from Jesus’ divine status, his view will be normative—whether it accords
with that of “the assured results of modern biblical criticism”—
or not.
Jesus regarded the Old Testament as entirely the Word of God,
quoted it as fully authoritative, never contradicted it, and took
its historical narratives as historical fact.
Jesus’ high view of Scripture is evident from his specific declarations to that effect. Said he:
“Not a jot [the yod, the smallest letter of the Hebrew alphabet]
or a tittle [the calligraphic shading of the letters of the Hebrew
alphabet] shall pass from the Law until all is fulfilled” (Matthew 5).
True, among the Jews of the time (and today), the “Law” could
mean either the Ten Commandments, or the Pentateuch, or the
entire Old Testament; that Jesus used it in the sense of the
whole Old Testament is clear from his assertion elsewhere: “Is
it not written in your Law, I said, Ye are gods?” (John 10:34)—
the passage referred to being in the Psalms (Psalm 82:6), which
is in neither the Ten Commandments nor the Pentateuch.
“Search the Scriptures: . . . they testify of me” (John 5:39).
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“Beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to
them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke
24:27).
Jesus’ belief in the revelational character of the entire Old Testament is also clear by implication from his teachings.
He quotes authoritatively from a wide variety of books of the
Old Testament, early and late, and in doing so employs the formula, gegraptai: “it is written.”
This passive construction requires a “personal agent” (“it is
written by someone”), which here Jesus takes to be God the Father.
At no time does Jesus, like the modern-day biblical critic, focus
on the human writers of the Old Testament books or attempt to
explain their teachings in terms of the peculiar cultural conditions of the time.
Jesus’ approach gains modern support from G. Ernest Wright
(The Old Testament Against Its Environment).
It cannot seriously be doubted that Jesus views the Old Testament as a unitary work by a single, divine Author.
In his encounter with the devil in the wilderness (Matthew 4,
Mark 1, Luke 4), Jesus counters the devil’s quotations of Scripture out of context with a text from Deuteronomy 8:3: “Man
shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds
out of the mouth of God”—the clear implication being that the
whole of the Old Testament must be treated as the Word of
God.
Had Jesus not believed in the full authority of the Old Testament, this would have been the ideal opportunity to say so; he
could have declared: “Come, come! We are cosmic beings, not
naïve, culturally-bound humans. There is no need to act as if
the Bible were an inerrant source of information. Let us deal
with general principles, not engage in literalistic, fundamentalistic “proof-texting.”
By making this clear, Jesus could have saved Bible societies
the immense amounts of money they have spent in disseminating the whole Bible throughout the world, as well as in trans-
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lating the Scriptures in their entirety into a variety of minor
tongues.
Jesus never criticised the Old Testament; he accepted its teachings in every respect.
He frequently criticised the religious leaders of his day for allowing their settled traditions to overwhelm the original scriptural message; but that is hardly the same thing as criticising the
Bible itself—quite to the contrary.
When Jesus uses the formula, “It was said of old time ‘x’ (‘do
not murder,’ ‘do not commit adultery’), but I say to you ‘y’ (‘do
not be angry without cause,’ ‘do not lust in your heart’),” he is
not contradicting Old Testament teaching; he is saying “Not
only ‘x,’ but also ‘y.’”
Otherwise, one would have to conclude that Jesus was really
saying, “Don’t be irrationally angry and don’t lust—but go
ahead and kill and commit adultery if you like”!
Unlike the higher critics, Jesus considered the most difficult
Old Testament passages for modern readers to be history--not
metaphor, myth, or poetry.
Jesus believed the Adam and Eve narrative (Genesis 2) to recount an historical event which had occurred “at the beginning”
of human history (Matthew 19:4-6; Mark 10:6-9).
He considered the Noahic flood to have been an actual, historical occurrence, and paralleled it with his own Second Coming
(Matthew 24:37 ff).
He held that the “Jonah and the whale” incident was factual,
and used it as the “only sign” of his own, forthcoming resurrection (Matthew 12:38 ff).
The beast in question was not necessarily a whale; the Hebrew
and Greek words signify a “great fish” or a “sea monster.” The
translators of the Authorised Version identified it with the largest aquatic beast they knew. In any case, even a whale could
swallow a man and the man survive, as has happened in other
cases (72 Bibliotheca Sacra 334 [1915]; 25 Princeton Theological Rev. 636 [1941]).
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As to the list of books comprising the Old Testament validated
by Jesus, we know which they were, for the Jewish historian
Josephus (Contra Apionem, ca. A.D. 100) specifies the number
as 22.
“The five of Moses were of course the Pentateuch; the thirteen
of the prophets probably included the eight regular nebî’îm plus
Daniel, Job, Chronicles, Ezra-Nehemiah, and Esther; the ‘four
hymns and maxims’ would most naturally consist of Psalms,
Proverbs, Canticles, and Ecclesiastes. There is little doubt that
his twenty-two books are those of our present Hebrew canon”
(G. L. Robinson and R. K. Harrison).
This collection (identical to what is today found in Protestant
Bibles) does not include the so-called Old Testament Apocrypha, for they were never part of the Hebrew Scriptures (they
originated for the most part in Hellenistic Judaism during the
intertestamental period).
These books have therefore not received Jesus’ divine stampof-approval as revelatory, though they are useful for historical
and religious purposes (and were translated and placed in a separate category by Luther and by the translators of the Authorised Version).
They are included in Roman Catholic editions of the Bible because the Council of Trent (1546), in opposing the Reformers,
made their acceptance a de fide matter, and this was confirmed
by the first Vatican Council in 1870.
It will be observed that, in the case of the Old Testament, the
authority and reliability of the material is established by Jesus’
own (divine) stamp of approval on it, not on textual investigations of the kind we entered into in reference to the New Testament documents.
This is not to say that there is not good archaeological support
for many events of Old Testament history, e.g., the details of
patriarchal history as recounted in the earliest biblical books
(K. Kitchen; E. Yamauchi; G, Archer; W. Kaiser).
Indeed, the critics of Old Testament history have been continually forced to revise their negative judgments on the basis of
new evidence (for example, after asserting that Moses could
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not possibly have written the Pentateuch because there was no
writing system available to him, the critics were confronted by
archaelogical evidence of no less than three writings systems in
use in the Egypt of his day).
But such external confirmations touch only a portion of the entire content of the Old Testament books; and thus, without a
transcendent Word establishing their revelational authority,
one cannot make definitive revelational claims in their behalf.
4.3
As for the New Testament, Jesus proleptically established its
authority and revelational character as well.
4.31
He promised his Apostles a special gift of his Holy Spirit which
would insure a “total recall” of his teachings (O. Cullmann).
“When the Holy Spirit shall come, he will guide you into all
truth. . . . He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and
shall show it unto you” (John 16).
“The Comforter, who is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will
send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all
things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said to you”
(John 14).
The gift so described was not for believers in general or for the
church, but only for the apostolic company, since only they had
been present to hear Jesus’ original teaching during his earthly
ministry (and so were the only ones capable of having it
“brought to their remembrance”).
In collecting the writings to be included in the New Testament,
the early church therefore employed as principal criterion that
of apostolicity: a book had to be written by an Apostle or derive
from apostolic circles, for only then could it have benefited
from the gift of accurate recall promised to the Apostles.
A book did not have to be written personally by an Apostle, but
it had to have direct apostolic association (Mark’s Gospel with
the Apostle Peter, for example).
True, it took time for such decisions to be made in the case of
some New Testament books, but the early church was in the
best position to make the determination, since they were closest
in time to the apostolic age, and, in general, the Apostles were
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the first occupants of prominent bishoprics, whose immediate
successors had access to the needed corroborations.
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The early church came ultimately to entire agreement on which
books to include in the New Testament; and when, in the 16th
century, the question was raised again by the Reformers (who
insisted on the priority of Scripture over the church, and who
therefore could not simply accept the canonicity of the New
Testament because the church of their day said so), they also arrived at the very same conclusion as to which books should
comprise the New Testament canon on the basis of apostolicity.
4.33211 Even Luther, who had been deeply troubled by what he saw as
salvation by works in the Book of James and an absence of the
clear teaching of salvation by grace alone in the Book of Revelation, ultimately accepted these writings as apostolic.
4.332111 Luther’s problems with canonicity had no bearing on his belief,
in common with Augustine and the entire historic church, that
the Scriptures were inerrant; said he: “I have learned to ascribe
the honour of infallibility only to those books that are accepted
as canonical. I am profoundly convinced that none of these
writers has erred” (WA 2, 618).
4.33212 The Reformers saw the illogical circularity of grounding the
canon of Scripture in a decision of the church qua church, when
the Scriptures constitute the only standard by which the
church’s teachings must be judged.
4.332121 One could not rely on the so-called “Petrine theory” passage
(Matthew 16:18) to established ecclesiastical authority in the
supposed successors of Peter, for in saying “Thou art Peter
[Greek, Petros, a little stone], and upon this rock [Greek, petra,
a mass of rock] will I build my church,” Christ did not create
an identity between Peter and the church’s foundation, but must
have been referring to himself—or belief in him—as that rock
(cf. 1 Corinthians 3:11: “No other foundation [for the church]
can anyone lay than that which is laid, namely, Jesus Christ”).
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The imagery of the “four and twenty elders seated around the
Throne” in the last book of the New Testament (Revelation 4)
was not lost on the early church: this passage was commonly
seen to refer to the twelve Tribes of Israel (the Old Testament)
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together with the twelve Apostles (the New Testament)—both
having the same revelatory authority (even though the New
Testament constituted the final word, as the fulfillment of the
Old).
4.4
One may well ask how the foregoing argument can apply to
the majority of New Testament writings, namely those attributable to the Apostle Paul, since he was not one of the original apostolic band to whom Jesus’ promise of “total recall”
was given.
4.41
Paul, however, after his remarkable conversion to Christian
faith following his encounter with the resurrected Christ on the
road to Damascus, was accepted by the original Apostles as a
legitimate Apostle—one “grafted in” as a special Apostle to the
Gentiles (Acts 9).
He even corrected the Apostle Peter (Galatians 2:11 ff).
We may therefore conclude that Paul received the same gift as
the original apostolic band.
That this gift does not continue in the church—so as to provide
an “open-ended” Scripture subject to continual revision and addition—is shown by the fact that the apostolic company was
limited to the 1st century—an Apostle having to be “a witness
of Christ’s resurrection” (Acts 1:21-22).
Clear evidence that the Pauline writings were regarded as
Scripture—on the same level as the Old Testament—by the
original apostolic company is provided by 2 Peter 3:15-16,
where the writer speaks of “all the epistles of our beloved Paul
. . . in which are some things hard to be understood, which they
that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other
Scriptures, to their own destruction.”
The Greek for “Scriptures” in this passage is hai graphai—the
standard expression employed to refer to the Old Testament.
The early church finally accepted the Book of Hebrews into the
New Testament canon after concluding that, even though its
specific author could not be determined, the author (Barnabus,
perhaps) definitely operated within the Pauline circle; this
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meant that the book was subject to vetting by Paul, who had the
special apostolic gift to ensure its revelational quality.
4.5
One arrives, therefore, at a Bible—in its totality—whose authority and factual reliability have been established by God
himself by virtue of the imprimatur, nihil obtat placed upon
both Old and New Testaments by Jesus Christ, who demonstrated his Deity by his resurrection from the dead.
4.6
Does this conclusion commit us to an errorless Bible: a Bible
“inerrant” in all that it teaches and touches? Or can the
Scriptures be considered “spiritually” and “morally” trustworthy, while not necessarily without error in “secular” matters?
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The latter is the position of so-called “liberal evangelicals” (D.
Fuller, and many British evangelicals, who are uncomfortable
with the terminology of “inerrancy”).
The “partial inerrancy” view encounters a host of insuperable
difficulties.
First and foremost, as we have seen, this was not Jesus’ approach to the Bible (he took the narratives of the Old Testament
purporting to be history as having that very quality); and, as we
have also noted, one cannot avoid the force of Jesus’ divine
judgment on the matter by any kind of kenotic reasoning.
Significantly, Jesus declared: “If I have told earthly things and
you believe not, how shall you believe if I tell you of heavenly
things?” (John 3).
Indeed, it constitutes analytical nonsensicality to assert that the
Bible is true in those theological and moral areas where it cannot be verified, but is subject to error in “earthly” domains
where it can be tested.
Secondly, because all knowledge is intertwined, there is no
way effectively to separate the “secular” (and allegedly fallible) material in Scripture from the “religious” content of the Bible.
The divisions of knowledge—physics, chemistry, biology, geography, history, literature, art, theology, ethics, etc., etc.—are
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but arbitrary (they exist to keep us from going mad by trying to
study everything).
Thirdly, where Scripture is concerned, all attempts to split the
earthly from the heavenly are particularly unfortunate and obnoxious, since the central theme of the Bible is the Eternal entering the Temporal: God revealing himself in ordinary history
through prophets and Apostles, but especially by way of a genuine Incarnation, the Word becoming flesh.
Note, then, the meaninglessness of such questions as: “Is the
death of Christ on the cross a secular, historical event—or is it
a religious, theological event?” (It must in fact be both; indeed,
if it is not the former, it cannot be the latter, for then it is a nonevent.)
Parallel question: “Have you stopped beating your wife?”
The well-known adage Errare humanum est would seem to
eliminate the possibility of an inerrant book.
This philosophical tag, however, must itself by questioned: do
we really know the universe so well that we can be sure that
every human expression must contain error?
In point of fact, the expression derives from Platonic idealism—the belief that nothing on earth (the phenomena) can
reach the level of perfection of the metaphysical Ideal (the noumena).
This view, however, is manifestly incorrect: Euclid’s Geometry
contains no errors and is internally consistent—and who would
disagree that it is a human product?
Note that we do not argue that the Bible must be a divine revelation because it is inerrant; we argue, rather, that it must be a
divine revelation because Jesus, who proves himself to be God,
declares that it is such—and he regarded it as inerrant.
To assert that erring is at all times and in all places a necessary
characteristic of humanity has repercussions far beyond the denial of full authority to the Scriptures: if held consistently, it
would also eliminate the possibility of Incarnation and reduce
our Lord to necessary error in his teachings and conduct.
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Hans Küng, in arguing against papal infallibility (and scriptural
inerrancy) on such a ground appears unaware that he has cut off
the theological limb on which he is sitting—to the point of undermining a meaningful Incarnation and Trinitarian Christianity itself.
To maintain the total truth (inerrancy) of the Bible, one must reject the documentary criticism of the Old Testament, which
modifies the plain meaning of the text by recourse to hypothesised underlying sources and supposed editorial revisions of
the text.
Thus, the Graf-Kuenen-Wellhausen J-E-P-D theory, which
held that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses, as Jesus
thought, but was a 10th century B.C. paste-up created from four
major sources (one using Yahweh/Jehovah as the name for
God, one using Elohim for the name of God, one a priestly, sacrifice-orientated source, and one a deuteronomic or law-focused source).
What we have said previously as to the hopelessly subjective,
and therefore unscholarly, character of New Testament formand redaction-criticism applies equally here.
No manuscripts have ever been discovered which represent any
one of the supposed underlying sources of Old Testament
books.
The critics have by no means stopped with J-E-P-D; Morgenstern of Hebrew Union College endeavoured to divide a K
source into K and K1 .
“Review of activity in the field of Old Testament criticism during the last quarter century has revealed a chaos of conflicting
trends, ending in contradictory results, which create an impression of ineffectiveness in this type of research. The conclusion
seems to be unavoidable that the higher criticism has long since
passed the age of constructive achievement” (H. F. Hahn).
The attempt to rearrange the Old Testament material by way of
alleged sources has been deeply influenced by extrinsic, ideological considerations; thus, the naïve progressive-evolutionary thinking of the 19th century led critics to assert that
“primitive” blood-sacrifice passages must have come earlier
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than “advanced” moral-prophetic passages (thereby allegedly
showing the evolution of Old Testament religion from “lower”
to “higher” monotheism).
Higher critics of the Old Testament almost universally maintain that the Book of Isaiah is actually two books, one earlier,
the other (Deutero-Isaiah) later.
One of the chief reasons for this supposition is the critic’s antimiraculous bias: if the book is a unity, written at the time
claimed for it, it must contain de facto fulfilled prophecy (cf.
E.B. Pusey’s powerful refutation of antimiraculous postdating
[Daniel the Prophet]).
Our earliest manuscript of an Old Testament book, a Dead Sea
scroll Isaiah (ca. 125 B.C.), has the same text as in Bibles today, and shows no break whatsoever at the point where Deutero-Isaiah is supposed to commence.
Such examples make plain that rejection of Old Testament criticism has only one scholarly disadvantage: one will not be
asked to deliver papers at the conferences of the critics.
It is sometimes said that to regard the Old Testament as erroneous cannot touch the central issue of salvation as set forth in the
New Testament.
Nothing could be further from the truth, for:
Jesus was at pains to interconnect Old Testament events (many
of them especially problematic for “modern man”) with his
own saving work (e.g., “As [Greek, hôsper … houtôs, “even as
/ just as”] Jonah was three days and three nights in the beast’s
belly, so the Son of man be three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth”—Matthew 12); and
If Jesus was mistaken in his evaluation of Old Testament reliability, he could not have been God Incarnate, and thus could not
have saved us by his work on the cross.
To be sure, there are mediating theologians who refuse to give
up their belief in Christ while at the same time maintaining
views of the Old Testament entirely at variance with his own;
but this only confirms F. Pieper’s point that the illogic of liberal
theologians is a “happy [i.e., fortunate] inconsistency,” since if
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they applied a modicum of logic to their position they would
cease to be Christians at all.
But “everyone knows” that there are unresolvable errors and
contradictions in the Bible which militate against an inerrancy
view.
The così fan tutti approach is always dangerous.
Problem passages were not discovered yesterday; in the 5th
century Jerome and Augustine effectively dealt with alleged errors and contradictions which critics today think they have noticed for the first time.
Encyclopedic scholarship across the centuries has provided
resolutions of virtually all the claimed errors and contradictions
(e.g., those listed in the second part of Paine’s Age of Reason)—and, in general, there are often mulitfarious solutions
available, free of strained harmonisations or torturings of the
text (vid.: J. W. Haley; G. Archer; W. F. Arndt; and cf. A. Althamer, Conciliationes locorum Scripturae [1582]).
In the rare instances where a resolution of the problem does not
seem to be available, a lesson can be taken from the apparent
contradiction as between the Gospel accounts in regard to the
date of the crucifixion: was it on the 14th of the Jewish month
of Nisan or on the 15th?
The civil-lunar calendar, known for centuries, explains one dating; it required A. Jaubert’s discovery of a “Jubilees-Qumran”
calendar among the Dead Sea scrolls to explain the other—but
how many critics over the years were then proved wrong in not
accepting Jesus’ own strong view of Scripture?
We suggest a model for dealing with alleged errors and contradictions in the biblical text: the balance scale: E
J
U
Here, one balances the unresolved contradiction or error (E)
against Jesus’ own view of Scripture as the inerrant Word of
God (J). Even if a number of problems constitute E, their
weight will be finite, whereas Jesus’ view (being that of God
himself) will always have the greater weight.
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To be sure, the weight of J is not infinite, since it represents the
case for Jesus’ Deity and view of Scripture, not Deity per se;
however, that case is so powerful (as we have seen above) that
it will always be stronger than the problem posed by the difficult passage(s).
“If you chance upon anything [in Scripture] that does not seem
to be true, you must not conclude that the sacred writer made a
mistake; rather your attitude should be: the manuscript is
faulty, or the version is not accurate, or you yourself do not understand the matter” (St Augustine, De potent. IV, 1, 8).
We may therefore confidently regard the Bible in the same way
Jesus did, and this means regarding it in its entirety as the trustworthy Word of God.
4.7
Surely, however, this approach to the Bible is gainsaid by its
early chapters, involving a hopelessly primitive, unscientific
view of the beginning of the world and of human kind on the
earth?
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As to chronology, Archbishop Ussher (17th century) saddled
subsequent Bible printings of the Authorised Version with the
Creation date of 4004 B.C.
The Archbishop assumed that the genealogies of the Bible were
complete, omitting nothing.
But the genealogies of the Old Testament, like those of Jesus in
the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, include only the more important names: the word “begat” signifies only that the one begotten came after the begettor, not that the former was the
immediate offspring of the latter.
This makes it impossible to calculate backwards to the time of
Adam and Eve, much less to the Creation itself, by employing
biblical data.
A bench of bishops may be mistaken; even more so, a single
bishop.
It is hardly reasonable to criticise the author of Genesis for asserting that there was a first man and a first woman; logically,
there must have been such.
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The biblical text nowhere describes their appearance; perhaps
they were very hairy and their arms were long enough that they
could scratch their feet without bending over.
As for evolutionary theories of human origins, we are at liberty
to take either of the following two approaches;
We may say that evolutionary theory is so hopelessly saddled
with 19th century ideological baggage that in its main lines it
does not deserve acceptation; and that it has been unsuccessful
in its attempts to demonstrate amoeba-to-man evolution (A. E.
Wilder-Smith; W. R. Bird; H. Morris; D. Gish; J. Wells; P.
Johnson).
This is not to say that there has not been development within
species; all that is asserted is that the evolutionist has not
proven a crossing of species lines such that human development can be seen as the end product of the development of
“lower” forms of life.
Alternatively, we may say that—owing to the fact that (1) the
six creative days in Genesis 1 are intended to represent undefined periods of time (“one day is with the Lord as a thousand
years”—2 Peter 3), and (2) “the evening and the morning”
throughout the chapter is a poetical expression—evolution over
millions of years within the species types set out in Genesis 1
is compatible with the biblical account (E. J. Carnell; R. Mixter; R. C. Newman; H. J. Eckelmann)
It would not appear possible to extend this position to the view
that Genesis 1-2 is entirely poetic and has to do only with the
“what” and not the “how” of creation.
The text presents considerable detail concerning the “how” of
creation (for example, the important expression “after its kind”
is repeated again and again).
If the divine Author was only concerned with the “what,” it
would appear strange that he did not omit everything except
verse l: “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the
earth.”
It is worth remembering that neither the readers of Genesis nor
the critics of it were present at the Creation, and that contem-
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porary cosmological theories appear to have a very short shelf
life.
We are informed, in contrast, that Jesus Christ, the Word of
God, who believed the Genesis accounts, existed from eternity
and was himself involved in the Creation (John 1).
Genesis gives great longevity to the patriarchs.
Science has been unable to find a biological reason for death;
micro-organisms can be kept alive indefinitely.
The Bible gives sin as the reason for death (Rom. 3:23, etc.);
may it not have been the case that one of the effects of sin’s reinforcing itself from generation to generation was a radical
drop in longevity once certain population levels had been
reached?
Surely, the account of Noah and the Flood in Genesis 6-9 cannot be accepted today? Au contraire:
There are accounts of a universal Deluge among a vast number
of early cultures throughout the world, and many of these cannot be accounted for by cultural borrowing.
It is very hard to reconcile the Genesis text with a limited flood,
only affecting the Near East.
The Ark, as described in Genesis, is a remarkable piece of engineering—far beyond the knowledge and skills of the time (H.
Morris).
There would have been room for all the basic species types on
the Ark.
Variations might well have perished: thus the iguana survives
but not the dinosaur??
There is surprising evidence of the survival of at least identifiable remnants of the Ark on Mount Ararat in Eastern Turkey
(Montgomery).
What of “Joshua’s long day” (Joshua 10)?
It has long been recognised that Scripture often speaks phenomenally when dealing with matters of human observation
(Augustine; Rheticus, defending Copernicus’ De revolutionibus orbium caelestium; Calvin; cf. R. Hooykaas’ Gifford Lectures).
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We can hardly criticise such usage when we ourselves speak of
“the sun coming up in the morning”—although, in fact, it is the
earth, not the sun, which changes position.
Whatever the physical explanation of the event Joshua describes, had he recorded that event with a camera, it would have
shown the sun, not the earth, altering its movement.
We conclude that nothing in the early biblical narratives requires us to take a view of the inspiration, revelatory nature,
and factual correctness of the Bible different from that held by
Jesus Christ.
4.8
Over against the biblical worldview—indeed, contra the very
existence of the God of the Bible—looms the Problem of Evil:
how can there be a God who is both perfectly good (and therefore opposed to evil) and all-powerful (and therefore capable
of eradicating evil), when the world displays the presence of
evil on so many levels?
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As we shall soon see, and as Wittgenstein himself emphasised,
absolute moral judgments can only be justified transcendentally; it follows that the atheist, having by definition no such absolute source of morality, is in a particularly disadvantageous
position logically to offer ethical criticism of the actions of Deity.
We have already noted the inadequacy of trying to handle this
issue by maintaining that God lacks omnipotence (Brightman):
such a finite god is not the God of Scripture or the Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ; and he does not in any event constitute an attractive object of worship.
The earliest chapters of the Bible inform us that evil in the human sphere originated because the first humans chose to violate
God’s express will, and that, in consequence, they and their descendants suffered pain and death, and the natural world itself
lost its perfection (Genesis 3:15-19).
The tempter in that scenario is identified elsewhere in Scripture
as the devil, a former angel who himself fell as a result of a similar insistence on following his own way rather than acknowl-
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edging the sovereign will of God (Isaiah 14:12-15; Revelation
12:9, 20:2).
It follows that evil was not created by God but came about as
the result of God’s creatures’ misuse of their freewill.
Evil is neither a mere “absence of good” (Augustine) nor a substance: it refers to a broken relationship between the creature
and the Creator; from that broken relationship follow concrete
evils (plural)—sickness, death, crime, environmental catastrophe, etc.
Evil is not something God created; it is a perversion of the right
relationship with him, for which the creature is responsible.
Natural evils can follow from perverse human decisions, just as
physical illnesses are often produced psychosomatically by
wrong psychological attitudes.
Many so-called “natural catastrophes” today (such as African
famines) are in fact the product of human neglect of the environment or bad use of natural resources.
When the Bible asserts that the sin of Adam passed to his descendants, so that the entire human race is corrupted and needs
salvation (Romans 5:12), it speaks both biologically and sociologically: every human generation is born into the sinful context created by past generations, is impacted by them, and adds
to the burden for the future.
The Hebrew word Adam, like the Greek anthropos and the
Latin homo, means “mankind”; in that sense, the first man was
a representative of the entire race—a kind of perfect statistical
sampling of mankind in general.
Thus the truth of the old school-book doggerel: “In Adam’s
fall, we fell all”: had you or I been in the Garden, we would
have done the same as Adam and Eve did, so we are in no position to blame someone else for our condition.
Moreover, if we are honest with ourselves, we know that we
have, by our own personal, conscious decisions, gone against
the best dictates of our own conscience—to say nothing of divine standards (cf. J. S. Feinberg, The Many Faces of Evil).
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The key to understanding why the continuing presence of evil
in the world is not a bar to the existence of the God of the Bible
is, then, the reality of freewill.
Even if one operates with a Calvinist understanding of God as
the predestinarian Sovereign, the Problem of Evil is not insoluble, since God (not man) sets the standards of cosmic morality
(Plantinga).
“C’est le Père Noël qui fait la classe aux lutins. Quelquefois, il
perd patience et les menace d’appeler le directeur, mais les
lutins savent bien que c’est pour rire; c’est lui, le directeur” (G.
Solotareff, Dictionnaire du Père Noël).
Scripture, as a matter of fact, presents the interrelationship of
predestination and freewill as a mystery: man’s freewill is genuine and one must believe in order to be saved (John 3:16; Acts
16:30-31), yet salvation is God’s work alone—even faith being
the gift of God (John 1:12-13; Ephesians 2:8-9).
As Luther put it, fallen humanity has all the freewill needed to
choose a preferred path to hell—but not the capacity to climb
to heaven—since salvation is a matter of God’s grace alone.
“Double” predestination (God’s choosing not only the saved
but also the damned) is an obnoxious and unbiblical doctrine;
and so is the Arminian teaching that we have the capacity to assist in our salvation by contributing our faith (or our “predisposition toward faith”) to the salvatory process.
The revelatory facts take precedence over the logical difficulty;
as already noted, when fact and logic conflict, facts win.
God is love (1 John 4:8, etc.), and love entails freewill (John
7:17): the biblical God is not a puppet master, pulling strings so
as to force his creation to do what he wishes (C. S. Lewis).
Enforced love would not be love at all; it is rape—metaphysically even if not physically.
Every lover (and parent) knows this, or should know it: you
want your intended or your child to love you in return, and to
do what is best, but to force this upon the object of your love is
to destroy the possibility of a genuine, reciprocal love-relationship.
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Freewill means the possibility of rejecting love as well as of accepting it—with all the negative consequences which flow
from such rejection.
If the rejection is everlasting, the negative consequences will
likewise be eternal and everlasting; such a choice cuts one off
from all goodness and love, and leaves one with only one object
of worship: the egocentric self which has been the source of the
problem from the outset.
But does not determinism—biological or otherwise—prevent
our recourse to freewill as an explanation for the Problem of
Evil? Certainly not; for:
Determinism contradicts human experience (even the determinist functions as if he were making free decisions); and
Determinism is self-defeating (were it universally true, then the
determinist philosophy itself would have been predetermined
and could not claim to be objectively true); and
So-called “chaotic dynamics” shows that we are operating in an
open universe: though God has set out a pattern of general cosmic laws, he has indeed “left himself and us room to maneuver”
(Polkinghorne).
Did not God foresee the negative effects of sin, and, if so,
why—among the infinite possible worlds he could have created—did he not create one where Adam would not have
fallen?
To eliminate all possible fallen worlds in favour of one that
would not fall must be seen as the functional equivalent of
eliminating freewill from the creation in the first place.
Even the non-religious find couples morally unpalatable who
obtain “perfect” offspring by systematically destroying nested
embryos when ultrasound shows that, if born, they would display characteristics the parents dislike.
If freewill is essential to love, would this not mean that in eternity there would always have to be the possibility of new falls
into sin—contrary to the assurances of a perfect “new heaven
and new earth,” given, for example, in the Book of Revelation?
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As Augustine argued, the redemption of the world in Christ
moves the relationship between creature and Creator to a new
level—that of non posse peccari.
“We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19), so the likelihood of a repeat of the fall drops to zero as a limit in the face
of an undeserved redemption of infinite consequence.
Even granting the essential tie between love and freewill,
could—and, therefore, should—God not have limited the effects of man’s sin?
But if the consequences of moral acts are removed, their moral
character disappears: the language game changes from ethics to
play or to strategy: in our own interests, we will try more and
more clever ways to circumvent the law, knowing that a term
in gaol is no longer in the offing.
Why do not the consequences of sin fall only on the wicked?
Why does not God preserve the innocent from sin’s miseries?
Why does the godfather die comfortably at an advanced age
while the good citizen is struck down by the early onset of cancer?
Unfortunately, since “all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God” (Rom. 3:23; cf. Psalm 53:3; Isaiah 53:6; 1 John
1:8), there are no innocents.
As John Donne put it, the human race is inseparably interconnected: “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls: it tolls for
thee.”
Sin, by its very nature, is irrational, and its consequences likewise.
Sinful consequences in a broken world are like the effects of a
terrorist’s bomb, striking anyone within range, not necessarily
specific political opponents (cf. 11 September 2001).
Even genuine Christian believers are not exempted from the effects of a fallen world—the promise to them is, not that they
will never suffer but that “all things work together for good to
them that love God” (Romans 8:28).
But God could certainly have diminished the consequences of
sin without removing them entirely? Scripture teaches that:
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He has already done so, since if he had removed his hand from
the world after the fall, all would have returned to its original
state of chaos (Colossians 1:16-17); and
In spite of our killing his prophets and even his own Son, he has
provided the only way of salvation out of the misery we have
created for ourselves (Matthew 21; Mark 12; Luke 20; Romans
5:8); and
He promises an ultimate restoration of all things (Revelation
21-22); and
Those who have created the mess are in a particularly poor position to criticise the only One who is doing anything cosmically about it—simply because he is not working on their
schedule; and
Oddly enough, God, not ourselves, remains the sovereign in
these matters (Job 38-42).
Granted, the evils of this world are evident on every hand; but
the issue is: does their existence negate the clear evidence of
God’s love for us in coming to earth in Jesus Christ to deal with
this very problem?
One must not regard this matter as a question of weighing
quantities (deaths in the Holocaust, for example, against the
single death of Christ): if the case for Incarnation is a good one
(and we have seen just how excellent it is), that case stands regardless of the existence of human misery, whatever its degree.
Indeed, the greater the misery, the greater should be our gratitude to the One who loves us and gave himself for us.
“Scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet perhaps for a
good man some would even dare to die”—one thinks of Sidney
Carton in Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities—“but God commends
his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ
died for us” (Romans 5).
Even supposing that all objections to a fully trustworthy written revelation from God in Scripture can be successfully answered, what good would such a revelation do when, as is so
often said, “You can get anything out of the Bible”?
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One can indeed get anything out of the Bible—as long as one
is erroneously permitted to take anything to the Bible in interpreting it.
The Bible is a remarkably clear book.
Few would maintain, for example, that the passage beginning,
“There went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the
world should be taxed,” refers to the banana crop in Tanganyika.
“The Holy Scriptures are assuredly clearer, easier of interpretation, and more certain than any other writings, for all teachers
prove their statements by them, as by clearer and more stable
writings, and wish their own treatises to be established and explained by them. But no-one can ever prove a dark saying by
one that is still darker. Therefore, necessity compels us to run
to the Bible with all the writings of the doctors, and thence to
get our verdict and judgment upon them; for Scripture alone is
the true overlord and master of all writings and doctrines on
earth If not, what are the Scriptures good for?” (Luther, in WA
7, 308 ff.).
“I certainly grant that many passages in the Scriptures are obscure and hard to elucidate, but that is due, not to the exalted
nature of their subject, but to our own linguistic and grammatical ignorance. . . . Who will maintain that the town fountain
does not stand in the light because the people down some alley
cannot see it, while everyone in the square can see it?” (Luther,
De servo arbitrio [against Erasmus], WA 18, 606).
If the Bible is so clear, why are there many Christian denominations?
Many churches came into existence for purely historical and
cultural reasons, not because of doctrinal differences (e.g., the
Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, which could
no longer maintain its connection with the Anglican Church,
owing to the American Revolution).
In the case of those churches which differ theologically with
other churches, the points of contention are generally low on
the scale of major biblical teaching (e.g., whether to dunk or to
sprinkle in baptism).
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All Christian churches are by definition united in their understanding of the central doctrinal teachings of the Bible by virtue
of their commitment to the Ecumenical Creeds (Apostles’,
Nicene, and Athanasian).
Where there is nonetheless disagreement among Christians as
to what the Bible teaches, this is to be attributed to human failings, not to God’s inability to make himself clear.
The interpretation of the Bible depends on the same general
principles which must be employed in understanding any written material—principles which have been codified and are
common to literary hermeneutics and to the legal construction
of documents.
There is no special, unworldly, “spiritual” hermeneutic applicable uniquely to the Bible, for the Scriptures are written in human language and employ the grammar, syntax, and
vocabulary of human language.
The declared purpose of the Scriptures is to reveal, not to provide a recondite, in-group, Gnostic message.
One must be very suspicious of views such as that of Watchman Nee, who maintained that only true believers can understand the Bible, for only they have a “renewed mind” (nous).
Salvation does indeed make “all things new” for the believer (2
Corinthians 5:17), but it does not change the character of the
human language of the Bible, nor does it remove the new Christian from the planet.
The fundamental hermeneutic rules have been well set forth in
the field of law, where sound interpretation of legal instruments
is essential to achieving societal justice.
“I have long felt that problems of interpreting legal texts are
closer to theology than to literary theory” (W. Twining).
Statutory interpretation entails the following basic principles:
(1) Words that are reasonably capable of only one meaning
must be given that meaning whatever the result (the so-called
literal rule).
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(2) Ordinary words must be given their ordinary meanings and
technical words their technical meanings, unless absurdity
would result (the golden rule).
(3) When an Act aims at curing a defect in the law, any ambiguity is to be resolved in such a way as to favour that aim (the
mischief rule),
(4) An Act must be construed as a whole, so that internal inconsistencies are avoided.
In the law of contracts, the parol evidence rule sets forth the
same hermeneutic philosophy: integrated writings cannot be
added to, subtracted from, or varied by the admission of extrinsic evidence of prior or contemporaneous oral or written agreements; extrinsic evidence is admissible to clarify or explain the
integrated writing, but never when it would contradict the writing.
The construction of deeds follows the same approach: the parties are presumed to have intended to say that which they have
in fact said, so their words must be construed as they stand.
“The Court has to take care that evidence is not used to complete a document which the party has left incomplete or to contradict what he has said, or to substitute some other wording for
that actually used, or to raise doubts, which otherwise would
not exist, as to the intention. When evidence is admitted in connection with interpretation, it is always restricted to such as will
assist the Court to arrive at the meaning of the words used, and
thus to give effect to the intention so expressed” (Sir Roland
Burrows).
Likewise in constitutional interpretation: “As men whose intentions require no concealment, generally employ the words
which most directly and aptly express the ideas they intend to
convey, the enlightened patriots who framed our Constitution,
and the people who adopted it, must be understood to have employed words in their natural sense, and to have intended what
they have said” (Chief Justice John Marshall, Gibbons v
Ogden).
In sum: Non est interpretatio, sed divinatio, quae recedit a litera (Lord Bacon).
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This approach of taking written material literally unless the
context requires a non-literal meaning, and refusing to alter the
clear meaning of a text by the introduction of extrinsic materials, applies equally in the literary field in general and in biblical
interpretation in particular.
A sound literary interpretation is “one which is absolutely commensurate in its basic, inferential, and evaluative propositions
with the data, the implications, and the values contained within
the work” (Elder Olson, “Hamlet and the Hermeneutics of
Drama”).
“It is a fundamental principle to assume that there is one intended, literal, proper sense to any given passage in Scripture
(‘sensus literalis unus est’); also that the Scripture is its own
best interpreter (‘Scriptura Scripturam interpretat’ or ‘Scriptura
sui ipsius interpres’). . . . The literal sense thus always stands
first and each interpreter must guard against cluttering that
which is being communicated with his own ideas, lest the
meaning be lost” (Eugene F. A. Klug).
The biblical interpreter’s axiom, therefore, is that data extrinsic
to a text may be used ministerially (to clarify or reinforce the
meaning of the text), but never magisterially (to criticise or alter the natural meaning of the text).
It follows that extra-biblical linguistic and cultural considerations must never decide the interpretation of a text, and any use
of extra-biblical material to arrive at an interpretation inconsistent with the plain meaning of a scriptural passage is to be rejected.
Extra-biblical data can and should put critical questions to a
text, but only Scripture itself can legitimately answer questions
about itself.
To insist on the “plain” or “natural” meaning of a text is not
necessarily to insist on a literal interpretation; the natural meaning may in fact be poetical, parabolic, or metaphorical—but
only the biblical material itself can determine this.
The Psalms are poetic in format; thus one need not assume that
the mention of unicorns and dragons therein requires zoological treatment.
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When Jesus says that he is setting forth a parable, it is a waste
of energy to seek archeologically for the address of the Good
Samaritan.
When, however, Paul states that, owing to not discerning the
body of Christ in the Eucharist, some have become physically
weak and sick and others have died (1 Corinthians 11), one
must not regard Jesus’ assertion, “This is my body,” as metaphorical.
It will be observed that the hermeneutic approach here set
forth—and required for meaningful interpretative activity in
law, literature, and ordinary life—is at utter loggerheads with
the fallacious “Hermeneutic Circle” methodology of the existentialists and post-modernists, discussed earlier.
The latter approach is followed by Rudolf Bultmann and his
post-Bultmannian followers (Ebeling, Fuchs, Conzelmann,
Guenter Bornkamm, et al.), as well as by the so-called “New
Hermeneutic.”
By their interlocking of the text and the interpreter, and by allowing extra-biblical materials to determine the meaning of the
biblical text, these theologians turn the Bible into what Luther
felicitously characterised as a “wax nose,” which they twist in
the direction of their own presuppositions and contemporary
cultural values.
This approach has been hilariously caricatured in the literary
field by Frederick C. Crews (The Pooh Perplex), who develops
an entire series of contradictory portraits of Winnie the Pooh
(romantic, Marxist, psychoanalytic, etc.) by allowing the interpreter’s Weltanschauung to obscure the meaning of the original
stories.
To understand any text (Pooh or Philippians), one must ask the
questions: What kind of book is this? And: What is it trying to
tell me?, i.e., What is its central theme?
In the case of Pooh, we have a children’s book, focusing on a
Bear of little brain but great of heart.
In the case of Philippians (and Scripture as a whole), we have
a book setting forth the Heilsgeschichte—the history of human
salvation—and focusing on the Saviour, Jesus Christ, who
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achieved that salvation by his atoning death on the cross and his
resurrection for our justification.
If we miss the fundamental theme of a writing, no amount of
attention to its details will give us its significance.
This is why fundamentalists who study, for example, the “birds
of the Bible” or endeavour to set forth a calendar of the “end
times” often have no idea as to the real point of Scripture.
This is why moralists who draw up plans for the renovation of
society by following the Sermon on the Mount or by posting
the Ten Commandments in schoolrooms lose sight of what the
Bible is actually teaching.
This is why religious liberals who occupy themselves with critiquing Old Testament history or applying Gnostic categories
to the New Testament might as well be reading the BhagavadGita for all the good it does them.
Biblical revelation is solid and it is perspicuous; but, in order to
benefit from it, one must set aside one’s prejudices, suspend
one’s disbelief, refuse to force the text into the mold of extrabiblical ideologies, and seek Christ there.
“Search the Scriptures, for they testify of me” (Jesus Christ).
“The whole of Scripture is about Christ alone, everywhere”
(Luther).
5
The perennial dilemma of man (corporate and personal) as to the meaning of existence finds its resolution
in Christian revelation.
5.1
“The unexamined life is not worth living” (Socrates).
5.11
Examination is called for as to the meaning of history, ethical
values, and the significance of human life.
If history is “a tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing” (Shakespeare), or, less elegantly, “bunk” and “the succession of one
damned thing after the other” (Henry Ford), then historical action loses all significance.
But how can historical meaning be established when we, as the
actors, are ourselves locked into the play?
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Neither individual nor societal life is possible without values.
The values may (and do) differ widely, and are often mutually
contradictory.
There must, on some level at least, be “honour among thieves.”
Among cannibals, rules of etiquette may require that one clean
her plate; the law may insist that femurs not be left in the front
garden so as to harm the environment.
In actual fact, anthropologists have observed that cannibal societies do not eat indiscriminately: there are invariably rules
which limit one’s diet to members of other tribes.
But would we be satisfied with the value systems of the thief or
of the cannibal, it being the case that we could well be the object of their attentions?
This is the painful difficulty generally ignored by ethical relativism and by the postmodern approach of “live and let live”:
one may find herself devoid of possessions and one of the ingredients of a stew if certain value systems are given legitimacy.
In the face of competing value systems, which should be accepted and which rejected? And from where ought the criteria
to come?
Human rights are essential in a world in which governments,
power groups, and individuals so often trample upon minorities
and the weak.
War crimes trials such as those held in Nuremberg at the end of
World War II have no choice but to appeal to values transcending national interests.
Otherwise, the trials become nothing more than an expression
of the power of the victor over the vanquished.
But where are transnational values to be sought?
“In order to discover the rules of society best suited to nations,
a superior intelligence beholding all the passions of men without experiencing any of them would be needed. This intelligence would have to be wholly unrelated to our nature, while
knowing it through and through; its happiness would have to be
independent of us, and yet ready to occupy itself with ours; and
lastly, it would have, in the march of time, to look forward to a
distant glory, and, working in one century, to be able to .enjoy
in the next. It would take gods to give men laws” (Rousseau,
Contrat social).
5.2
Secular attempts to establish the meaning of history have
been conspicuous failures.
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Kant held that “"the history of the human race, viewed as a
whole, may be regarded as the realisation of a hidden plan of
nature to bring about a political constitution, internally, and, for
this purpose, also externally perfect, as the only state in which
all the capacities implanted by her in mankind can be fully developed.”
Kant tells us that man’s “unsociableness"—his “envious jealousy and vanity” and “unsariable desire of possession or even
of power"—turns him from “idleness and inactive contentment” to “further development of his natural capacities.”
Here, Kant commits the basic moral fault of allowing the end
to justify the means.
The means employed to reach an end cannot be separated from
the end itself: a corrupt means will colour the end, corrupting it
as well.
And: like so many rationalists, Kant does not take evil seriously.
And: like so many classical philosophers, he makes apodictic
assertions about the historical process without factually investigating what actually occurs in history.
Hegel proclaimed a “World Spirit of Reason,” immanently
working in history, bringing mankind to an idealistic goal of
freedom by way of world-historical epochs, the last of which
would be the Germanic.
Kierkegaard rightly saw that Hegel’s confidence that, unaided
by revelation, he could understand the Essence of all history
was sheer bombast.
However, when Kierkegaard offered the Existential answer
(that we can never know more than our own existential condi-
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tion and that “truth is subjectivity”), he went from one false solution to another.
As finite and fallen creatures, we cannot obtain a valid total picture of the world or of its history, but we certainly can arrive at
objective truth on a limited scale (cures for lumbago; the construction of bridges; the determination that Caesar was assassinated on the Ides of March and that Jesus rose again on Easter
morning).
Kierkegaard found in his personal Existenz the saving Christ;
the most prominent 20th century existentialists who followed in
his train (Heidegger, Sartre, et al.) found only Angst and estrangement, and, having cut themselves off from the possibility
of an objective ladder out of the quicksand of subjectivity, they
had nowhere to go but to meaninglessness and ethical relativism.
Kierkegaard suffered from an understandable, but deadly, case
of fideism and perhaps even of historical skepticism; Wittgenstein, however, faced by analogous bombast to that of Hegel in
the philosophical community, did not contract those diseases—
pace many of his interpreters.
“I want to sound a warning about the relationship between the
Wittgensteinian insights I have propounded and the critical
project in which The Sceptic is engaged. . . . The Sceptic moves
from rejection of ‘the enlightenment project’ and its notions of
abstract and absolute truth to a rejection of the possibility of objective rationality at all. This is a move from rejection of a particular epistemological theory to denial of the possibility of
knowledge at all” (G. A. Smith).
The assertion of the existence and activities of Hegel’s Westgeist partakes of a large dose of technical meaninglessness—
since the World Spirit is not definitionally true, nor is there any
apparent way to demonstrate it factually.
World history hardly moves forward in a rectilinear fashion:
granted, plumbing seems steadily to improve, but most areas,
such as artistic endeavour, are anything but progressive.
Would anyone in her right mind consider Marcel Duchamp’s
ready-mades or “Nude Descending a Staircase” on the same
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level of artistic quality as Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel or
Rembrandt’s “Night Watch”?
Hegel’s historical philosophy suffered from his own temporality; from our perspective, against the background of two horrific World Wars, Germany would hardly be regarded as the
modern vehicle of greater freedom for mankind; quite the opposite.
Hegel swallowed a very large dose of naïve 19th century progressivism.
Autosuggestionist Emile Coué advised our repeating, “Every
day, in every way, we are getting better and better”: unfortunately, repeating this, instead of reflecting necessary improvement, may only give the repeater laryngitis.
Hegel’s dialectic (“thesis” leading to “antithesis,” the two
struggling together to produce a higher “synthesis” which in
turn becomes a new “thesis”) cannot be shown to function as a
universal motor of historical action.
We have already seen that this “dialectic logic” is not a logic at
all.
Even if all human action did operate dialectically, why should
it move upward, to higher and higher levels? Why might it not
reach greater and greater depths of depravity, considering the
human condition and the testimony of history itself?
When Karl Marx “turned Hegel on his head” by understanding
progress in history as a materialistic, not an idealistic, necessity, he succeeded no better than Hegel in finding historical
meaning.
Marx’s employment of Hegel’s dialectic contaminated his historical philosophy with all the difficulties of Hegel’s naïve progressivism.
Why, for example, should the state and law “wither away” so
as to produce the perfect, classless society? In point of fact,
“power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely”
(Lord Acton).
Marx’s materialism, derived from Feuerbach (“Der Mensch ist,
was er ißt”), is unprovable, whether in its strong form (every-
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thing is material) or in its weak variety (everything significant
is material).
To claim that all “ideology” (political ideas, the state, the law,
justice, philosophy, literature, art, morality, religion, etc.) is
mere “superstructure,” founded upon and always determined
by the materialistic, economic “base” is in itself to set forth an
ideology—and an unverifiable one at that.
Were Feuerbach and Marx correct on this point, it should be
possible to produce Johann Sebastian Bachs by feeding little
Germans the same diet of Wienerschnitzel that Bach consumed.
Marx’s economic reductionism is likewise unrealistic.
History does indeed show that material factors influence ideological development (e.g., the effect of the shifting balance of
trade in the Mediterranean on the progress of the Italian Renaissance); but it equally shows the reverse causal sequence
(e.g., the effect of Eli Whitney’s invention of the cotton gin on
world industrial development).
Marx’s view of human nature was skewed in the extreme.
He believed that humans are basically good and that only the
evils of a corrupt, capitalistic economy produce the sorry conditions of modern life.
But who created the social conditions in the first place? Martians? Or the very human beings who are supposed to be basically good?
A radical change in the ownership of the means of production
in society is supposed, in Marxian terms, to produce “new
men,” i.e., humans no longer desirous of subjugating their fellows.
Yet liberated “Soviet new men,” such as Stalin, perpetrated
some of the most horrific human rights violations in all of
world history (cf. Solzhenitsyn’s descriptions of the Gulag).
Spengler (The Decline of the West) argued that history moves
in cyclical patterns, and that self-contained human cultures follow a 1ife cycle similar to that of living organisms and nature;
thus a culture develops from barbarism to a civilized classical
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period, and finally stagnates, decays, and dies in a new barbarism of hypercommercialism.
But why should systems of relations (cultures) created by organic beings have the same life cycles as those beings?
And why should Spengler’s particular set of value judgments
be accepted as binding upon history (e.g., instinct favoured
over understanding, the life of the soil over the life of the city)?
Toynbee identified thirty-four historical civilisations and
claimed that the future of ours depends upon effectively “responding” to the “challenges” we face; and he declared that
“the societies of the species called civilisations will have fulfilled their function when once they have brought a mature
higher religion to birth.”
“Toynbee still believes that the idea of ‘challenge and response’ constitutes a magical key to the why and how of human
creativity. But is it not, after all, little more than a formal principle, like Hegel’s dialectic, which cannot provide us with a
canon of interpretation?” (G. Masur).
Why must a civilisation produce a new religion to fulfil itself?
If Jesus declared that he was “the Way, the Truth, and the Life”
and that “no person comes to the Father” but by him—as he did
(John 14:6)—and demonstrated his finality by his resurrection
from the dead, would it not follow that a civilisation producing
a new religion contradicting this would have done just the opposite of fulfilling itself?
Common to the philosophies of history just surveyed, and to all
other secular interpretations of the past, are built-in deficiencies which vitiate their claims to an adequate understanding of
history’s meaning, viz.:
The goals they set for history (Kant’s reason, Hegel’s freedom,
Marx’s classless society, Toynbee’s ecumenical civilization)
cannot be demonstrated to have a necessitarian character about
them.
In choosing their respective goals, the secular philosophers of
history continually make judgments as to what is significant
and what is valuable (Hegel’s idealism, Marx’s materialism,
Spengler’s favouring of instinct and the agrarian society); but
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in no case are they able to justify these value judgments in absolute terms.
The secular philosophers of history always enter upon their
work with an unjustified, unprovable concept of human nature
(the optimistic view of man held by Kant, Hegel, and Toynbee,
the ambiguous view held by Marx, the pessimistic view held by
Spengler).
These philosophers gratuitously presuppose ethical principles
(Hegel’s exempting of history’s “great men” from the ordinary
standards of right and wrong, Marx’s willingness to let the end
justify the means in bringing about the classless society
through revolution).
The common denominator here is the “human predicament”:
the lack of absolute historical perspective on the part of finite
man.
We are all “on the road” (Jack Kerouac).
All secular attempts to find the meaning of history necessarily
view the past from the limited historical perspective of the observer, who assumes that past trends can be used to predict future happenings.
But the secular philosopher of history has no way of knowing
what proportion of total history is represented by the past she
contemplates.
She therefore cannot determine whether her understanding of
“her” past constitutes an adequate statistical sample of the entire universe of historical experience (i.e., of history as a
whole).
But without knowing that her past can also represent the future,
she is in no position to generalise from that past to an unknown
future, and she is therefore logically precluded from making
apodictic assertions concerning the goal, if any, of the historical drama.
Lack of perspective on the human drama as a whole will also
mean that the secular interpreter cannot in any absolute sense
know what is more or less significant or valuable in the total
history of mankind.
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Because she is able to acquaint herself personally with only a
fraction of all the members of the human race, past, present,
and future, her conception of human nature can have only limited value, and is certainly not an adequate basis for historical
generalisation.
The secularist’s ethical ideals will also reflect her stance in history, and will therefore not be capable of justification in absolute terms.
Secular and humanistic historical searchlights are incapable of
illuminating all of the path we have traversed, and they continually meet a wall of fog ahead.
It follows that secular philosophers of history have often—
though unwittingly—served as the blind leading the blind.
Even in principle, the only way to a sound understanding of the
significance of the historical drama would require a perspective
outside of time, unconditioned by it, but capable of observing
the entire expanse of historical experience, past, present, and
future.
Transcendence, and transcendence alone, satisfies these conditions.
But only if the Transcendent were to communicate with us as
to history’s meaning would a transcendent answer do us any
good.
An Aristotelian Deity, aloof from human affairs, would leave
us in the same predicament as if he did not exist at all.
Not so the God of the Bible, who, as we have seen, revealed
himself both in the living Word (Christ) and in the written
Word (the Holy Scriptures)—and has thereby given us the key
to the historical drama.
The biblical God informs us that history is not a cyclical movement without beginning or end (the Greek understanding), but
a linear pattern beginning with mankind’s creation and fall,
centring on God’s act of love and redemption for us in Christ,
and coming to ultimate fulfilment in his return at the end of
time and the restoration of all things in a new heaven and a new
earth.
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There is no circularity in holding simultaneously to the justification of Christian truth by way of an objective historical investigation of Jesus’ miraculous resurrection from the dead and to
the need for revelational principles to understand the overall
meaning of history.
The total historical picture can only be grasped by finite man
when its significance is revealed from a transcendent perspective.
This does not preclude our being able, without the prior benefit
of revelation, to investigate limited historical particulars and
arrive at a proper interpretation of them (the Battle of Waterloo,
the death of Lincoln, the resurrection of Jesus Christ).
In the case of Jesus, investigation of his life, death, and resurrection leads us to divine revelation; and that divine revelation
then gives us an overall understanding of the meaning of the
general historical drama which we could never have arrived at
otherwise.
5.3
Natural law theory has tried—and failed—to establish an independent foundation for ethics and human rights.
5.31
Three major stages of natural law thinking in the West can be
identified.
From Augustine, through Aquinas, to Blackstone, it was held
that because of sin, the natural morality written on the human
heart (Romans 1) requires clarification and correction by way
of the special revelation from God provided in the Holy Scriptures.
“If our reason were always, as in our first ancestor before his
transgression, clear and perfect, unruffled by passions, unclouded by prejudice, unimpaired by disease or intemperance .
. . we should need no other guide but [the law of nature]. . . .
This has given manifold occasion for the benign interposition
of divine providence; which, in compassion to the frailty, the
imperfection, and the blindness of human reason hath been
pleased, at sundry times and in divers manners, to discover and
enforce its laws by an immediate and direct revelation. The
doctrines thus delivered we call the revealed or divine law, and
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they are to be found only in the Holy Scriptures” (Sir W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England).
In the second stage, at the time of the 18th century French and
American revolutions, it was maintained that the “God of
Scripture” should be replaced by the “God of Nature” (Paine,
Jefferson), and that God’s implantation of morality in man’s
nature was sufficient without any special, written revelation
from the Creator.
The Bible was regarded, by Deists and philosophes, as a book
of ancient superstitions, unworthy of their newly founded “Age
of Reason.”
Finally, with the advent of Darwinian evolutionary theory and
Nietzsche’s declaration of “the death of God” in the 19th century, followed by the 20th century secular human rights movement, ethical values have come to been understood as built-in
humanistic phenomena, requiring no appeal whatsoever to a divine Creator (cf. Michel Villey).
There are overwhelming difficulties common to the two later
stages of natural law thinking.
Assertions of natural morality, unassisted by biblical revelation, suffer from such vagueness and ambiguity that they offer
little assistance in dealing with practical ethical issues.
Thus, the classic definition of natural law from the Digest of the
Justinian Code: “Honeste vivere; alterum non laedere; suum
cuique tribuere.”
This formulation is so “imprecise” that it really does no more
than to underscore the need for “some kind of equity” (C. Friedrich).
The third part of the Justinian definition, “To give each person
what he deserves,” was inscribed by the Nazis on the gate leading into the death camp at Buchenwald: “Jedem das Seine.”
The advocates of a non-revelational natural law cannot agree
among themselves as to its content, and, even if they did, the
result would not necessarily represent a true ethic.
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To believe that agreement = truth, or that validity can be arrived
at by voting, is to commit the logical fallacy of consensus gentium.
In Ray Bradbury’s classic, The Illustrated Man, all the futuristic world’s population had the same dream, that the world
would end on a particular night; by unanimous vote, fathers
killed their children in a painless way to prevent their suffering
from the cataclysm; but the adults woke up the day after and the
world had not ended.
Fifty million Frenchmen can be wrong.
Secular natural law efforts to provide an adequate answer to
man’s ethical dilemma may be denominated “Jiminy Cricket
solutions,” for they say in essence, “Let your conscience be
your guide.”
But conscience is culturally influenced, if not determined.
Did not Dickens’ Fagin make his little charges feel guilty for
not stealing more expensive watches?
Secular natural law thinking exemplifies what G. E. Moore
termed the “naturalistic fallacy”: the belief that one can move,
without more, from the descriptive to the normative, from the
“is” to the “ought.”
The only valid ethical move from “is” to “ought” occurs when
God descriptively reveals what he declares to be normative.
It now becomes evident why St Paul, in dealing with Stoic natural law thinkers on the Areopagus, declared: “Men of Athens,
I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious. For as I
passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this
inscription: ‘To the Unknown God.’ Whom therefore you ignorantly worship, him I declare unto you. . . . And the times of this
ignorance God winked at; but now commands all men everywhere to repent: because he has appointed a day when he will
judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he has ordained; whereof he has given assurance to all men, in that he
has raised him from the dead” (Acts 17).
Natural morality partakes necessarily of superstition and ignorance unless special revelation clarifies and corrects it.
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Contemporary natural law thinkers such as J. Finnis thus make
a fatal mistake when they endeavour to set forth natural law
theories which allegedly do not require God to exist or to reveal
himself.
This is especially sad when the thinker is himself personally a
Christian believer (as in Finnis’ case).
5.4
Other inadequate secular solutions to the ethical dilemma include intuitionism, situationism, and contextualism.
5.41
Intuitionism (Plato, H. Sidgwick, G. E. Moore) holds that ethics commences from an incorrigible, indefinable, unanalysable
starting point—“the Good” being known directly, without inference from something else and without the possibility (or the
necessity) of independent justification; one begins and ends
with the perception of universal ethical relationships.
We have already seen the failure of intuition as a general test
for truth; it does not suddenly rehabilitate itself because it is
brought to bear on ethical questions.
“Whatever the difficulties in this general epistemological theory, in ethics there is the additional difficulty that the commonsense roots of the problem of justification—the inescapable
fact of disagreement on fundamental ethical matters—are untouched by the doctrine of intuitionism” (A. Phillips Griffiths).
Situation ethics (J. Fletcher) holds that (1) only one thing is
good, and the ultimate norm of decision-making, namely, love;
(2) love and justice are the same (justice is love distributed); (3)
love wills the neighbour’s good; (4) the end justifies the means;
and (5) decisions should be made situationally, not prescriptively.
Since in situationism love, justice, and the neighbour’s good remain undefined, this ethical theory collapses into pure subjectivism.
We have already seen the dangerously fallacious nature of the
notion that the end justifies the means (appropriately held also
by Marxist-Leninism).
To incorporate it formally in one’s ethical system is to cut off
the limb on which one is sitting.
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Since all actions depend on the application of principles (unless
they are but subhuman, automatic responses to stimuli), there
are no non-prescriptive decisions.
Prescriptive decisions are of two kinds: (1) the prescriptions are
recognised as such and are therefore subject to analysis, criticism, and possible correction; and (2) the prescriptive basis is
concealed by talk of “love existentially arising from the situation itself.”
Scenario (2) yields a highly dangerous kind of decision-making, for there is no rational way of preventing wrongheaded and
perverse decisions when they are not open to principled discussion.
Situationism reduces to a naïve utilitarianism (“the greatest
good for the greatest number”), with all the problems inherent
in utilitarianism, such as:
The absence of any basis for establishing what is in fact “good”
for others (What they want or think is good for them? What I
(or a committee, or a government) believe they want or think is
good for them?); and
Tyranny of the majority, as illustrated by the celebrated eyebank analogy: Utilitarians would presumably insist that if eye
transplants become possible, a democratic vote could legitimate forcing those with two eyes to give up one of their eyes
for the utilitarian benefit of citizens blind in both eyes.
Contextual ethics (Paul Lehmann) maintains that proper ethical
decisions will arise in the context of community—in religious
terms, the “community of faith.”
Such a view painfully begs the question: Will the true community please stand up?
Since (last we heard) all human communities are made up of
sinful, self-centred, fallen human beings, why should any community have a special pipeline to ethical reliability?
Contextual ethics is “decision-making by bladder control”
(George Forell).
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This is because, more often than not, the persons who most influence final group decisions are those with the greatest staying
power.
What is needed to solve the ultimate problems of ethics and to
handle everyday moral quandaries is an absolute set of principles and a way of overcoming human self-centredness; but
these are unavailable from humanistic sources, which suffer
from finitude and the very moral failings which give rise to ethical dilemmas in the first place.
5.5
Kant’s ethic has had remarkable influence since the secular
Enlighenment of the 18th century; but it, too, when weighed
in the balance is found wanting.
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Kant separated ethics from theology, morals from God: this he
believed to be one of his greatest contributions; in fact, it was
one of his greatest mistakes.
Though he maintained that God’s existence could not be
proved (as by the classical, Aristotelian proofs), Kant held that
an absolute ethic was able to be demonstrated.
Thus, Kant’s categorical imperative: “Act only on that maxim
which you can will to be a universal law.”
This principle of “universalisability” fails to achieve its ethical
end:
The actions permitted by the rule remain undefined, so a perverse individual (a sado-masochist, for example) could well be
more than happy to have his activities extended to the world’s
population and be directed back upon himself.
Ghengis Khan (as representative of the tyrants of this world)
would not be persuaded by the categorical imperative to stop
raping and pillaging, for he would not agree that he and others
are equal members of a common humanity; they do not have
the strength to rape and pillage him, whereas he does have the
power to treat them in such a fashion.
Kant’s ethical philosophy collapses due to its rationalistic character: he assumes that human beings will view others as the rational equivalent of themselves and will therefore treat them as
they would want to be treated.
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Apart from a transformation of the selfish nature of man, such
an expectation is entirely unrealistic—even if human beings
were equal in strength, intelligence, and abilities (which they
are not).
For the Kantian approach to work, we would need:
A Creator God who declares every person to have the same ultimate worth as every other person—regardless of empirical
differences in personal characteristics; and
A Redeemer God who can transform human hearts so that they
will want to treat others as themselves.
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In modern legal philosophy and the theory of human rights,
attempts have been made to rehabilitate and apply the Kantian ethic; these neo-Kantian efforts succeed no better than
the original formulation.
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John Rawls offers a rationalistic, neo-Kantian political philosophy, dependent in part on 17th-18th century contract theories
(Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau).
For Rawls, human beings placed under a “veil of ignorance” as
to their special advantages will, by rationalistic necessity, arrive at his two fundamental Principles of Justice (embracing
civil and social rights) and thus establish a rationally-sound political and legal order.
But the last thing members of a fallen race are going to do is to
give up—even theoretically, to say nothing of practically—
their special advantages, since it is their personal strengths
(over against others) which give them the opportunity to exercise their selfishness.
And “even if Rawls’s theorem can be established, the self-interested moral skeptic may still decline to make a once-and-forall commitment, even to a principle chosen from self-interest.
Fidelity to principle is not, after all, deducible from bare formal
rationality” (Robert Paul Wolff).
The root problem with Rawls’ rationalism is thus the same as
that of his mentor Kant: he assumes that “formal rationality”
will yield “fidelity to principle” and other ethical virtues.
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Sinners have a nasty habit of disregarding virtue, even when it
would constitute the rational course of action—and even when
it would, in the long run, be in their own best interest.
Alan Gewirth applies Kantian universalisation to ethics and
concludes that it provides a solid basis for human rights.
He offers the following syllogistic argument:
(1) Human beings always act purposively.
(2) To act purposively, human beings must have freedom (embracing civil and political rights) and well-being (entailing social and economic rights).
(3) They must therefore object to the removal of or the interference with their freedom and well-being by others.
(4) The ground of one’s freedom and well-being is the mere
fact that one is a “prospective personal agent”; that ground does
not lie in any special strengths or characteristics one may possess.
(5) ∴ All prospective personal agents have rights to freedom
and well-being; and
(6) One ought to act in accord with the generic rights of one’s
recipients as well as of oneself—thereby establishing the general moral principle:
(7) Act in accord with the generic rights of your recipients as
well as of yourself.
In respect to crucial consideration (4), Gewirth argues that,
were one to reject it and “to insist, instead, that the only reason
he has the generic rights is that he has some more restrictive
characteristic R [such as] being an American, being a professor, being an Uebermensch, being male, being a capitalist or a
proletarian, being white, being named ‘Wordsworth Donisthorpe,’ . . . he would then be in the position of saying that if
he did not have R, he would not have the generic rights.”
Precisely! This is what a fallen human race always maintains:
that one’s special advantages, not one’s common humanity,
justifies one’s actions and special treatment.
Hegel, for example, asserted that the great men of history are
not subject to ordinary moral standards.
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Our favourite ethical example, Ghengis Khan, will be delighted
to point out that his right to do whatever he wishes (raping and
pillaging) derives from his personal strength and power, not
from any quality of prospective personal agent which he shares
with others; and that, had he not such strength and power, he
would of course become the object, not the subject, of raping
and pillaging.
It follows that attempts to justify and strengthen Gewirth’s position (e.g., by D. Beyleveld) have not been able successfully to
rehabilitate it.
5.7
The fundamental problem with secular ethical systems was
clearly recognised by Wittgenstein: “Die Ethik ist transzendental” (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 6.421).
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Wittgenstein explains this proposition in his posthumously
published Lecture on Ethics: “And now I must say that if I contemplate what Ethics really would have to be if there were such
a science, this result seems to me quite obvious. It seems to me
obvious that nothing we could ever think or say should be the
thing. That we cannot write a scientific book, the subject matter
of which could be intrinsically sublime and above all other subject matters. 1 can only describe my feeling by the metaphor,
that, if a man could write a book on Ethics which really was a
book on Ethics, this book would, with an explosion, destroy all
the other books in the world.”
Wittgenstein here recognises that:
(1) A genuine ethic would have to be an absolute ethic—true
for all times and all places.
Human rights must also have this characteristic: rights must be
“inalienable,” otherwise what human beings have created for
themselves, human beings can take away.
(2) No finite person is capable of providing such absolutes or
of writing a book which would contain them.
(3) The only possible source of true ethics would be a transcendental, absolute source; and
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(4) The only genuine book of ethics would be qualitatively different from all other books in the world and would by its very
nature “blow them up” by comparison.
Wittgenstein is here applying to ethics the ancient Archimedean principle that the only way to move the world would be to
employ a fulcrum outside the world:
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If the fulcrum were in or on the world, this would be the functional equivalent of trying to pull oneself up by one’s own bootstraps—the result being that one falls on one’s philosophical
derrière.
5.8
The Holy Scriptures constitute that “explosive book” of transcendent origin for which Wittgenstein sought in vain.
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It is that “pearl of great price,” worth the sale of all the other
ethical texts in one’s library in order to obtain it (Matthew 13).
The Bible provides absolute principles which establish the
needed ethical foundation for individual and corporate life;
these embrace:
(1) The Ten Commandments and other permanent moral guidelines of the Old Testament.
They do not include the civil and ceremonial laws of the Old
Testament, which, though genuinely revelatory (as Jesus
makes clear), were given to Israel to guide the community until
the coming of Messiah.
(2) The refinement and interiorisation of the Old Testament
moral law as provided by Jesus himself and by the New Testament writers.
Jesus stresses that the moral law is not fulfilled merely by external conformity to the law, as some of the Pharisees thought;
it also and especially requires a right inner attitude of heart (cf.
the Sermon on the Mount, etc.).
New Testament writers such as Paul and John teach that the
greatest motive for ethical conduct is gratitude for what God
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has done in giving his Son for our salvation (e.g., Romans 12;
1 John 4).
The Bible includes in its ethical teachings the foundations for
inalienable human rights—both so-called “first generation”
rights (civil and political freedoms), “second generation” guarantees (social and economic rights), and even newer rights of
the “third generation”:
(1) Procedural due process
--Impartiality of tribunals (Malachi 2:9; 1 Timothy 5:21)
--Fair hearing (Exodus 22:9)
--Speedy trial (Ezra 7:26)
--Confrontation of witnesses (Isaiah 43:9)
--No double jeopardy (Nahum 1:9)
(2) Substantive due process
--Versus unjust discrimination in general (Acts 10:34; Deuteronomy 16:19; Proverbs 24:23)
--The just and the unjust stand equally before the law (Matthew
5:45)
--Likewise all races and both sexes; condition of servitude irrelevant—vs. slavery (Galatians 3:28; Amos 9:7; Exodus 21:2)
--Likewise rich and poor (James 2:1-7; Amos 5:12; Isaiah 1:1617)
--Likewise citizens and foreigners (Exodus 12:49; Leviticus
23:22, 24:22; Numbers 9:14, 15:15-16)
--Even the sovereign is under the law (2 Samuel 11-12)
(3) Miscellaneous Basic 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Generation Rights
--Right to life, from the moment of conception (Exodus 20:13;
Psalm 51:5; Matthew 5:21-22; Luke 1:15, 41)
--Right to family life (1 Timothy 5:8)
--Versus inhuman or degrading treatment/punishment and torture (Luke 6:45)
--Freedom of thought, conscience, religion, expression, assembly, association, movement (John 7:17)
--Social and economic rights in general (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
--Right to universal education (Deuteronomy 6:7,11:19)
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--Right to work, to a fair remuneration, and to good working
conditions—protection of labour (Luke 10:7; 1 Timothy 5:18;
Deuteronomy 23:25-26, 24:6, 10, 12-13, 15)
--Right to protection of honour and personal reputation (Exodus 20:16)
--Right to leisure time (Exodus 20:8-11)
--Right to asylum (Exodus 21:13; Joshua 20; 1 Chronicles 6:67,
et al. (cities of refuge)
--Right to equitable distribution of land (Numbers 33:54; Leviticus 25:14-18, 25-34).
Biblical revelation also yields solid principles of political philosophy to assist a fallen race in organising the common life.
Scripture condemns anarchy; even bad government is better
than no government at all (Romans 13).
Scripture likewise condemns totalitarianisms, since they insist
on controlling and restricting the God-mandated activities of
believers (Acts 5:29).
Scripture recognises the dangers of autocratic rule (1 Samuel
8).
Scripture does not, however, require one particular form of
government, whether in the state (monarchy, republic, etc.) or
in the church (episcopacy, presbyterianism, congregational autonomy, etc.).
Scripture’s insistence on high human rights principles leads to
the inescapable conclusion that, whatever its form, any government in accord with revelational standards must not exist to
feather its own nest but must manifest the characteristics of an
“open society”: transparency, accountability, and sensitivity to
the public weal (Matthew 20:25-28; Mark 10:42-45).
The existence of a revelational bias in favour of democratic
forms of government would therefore appear to be a legitimate
inference from the totality of biblical data .
A further not illegitimate conclusion is that a biblical philosophy of government would support the ruling of the European
Court of Human Rights that those who actively promote the
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elimination of an open society have no right to function within
that society (Refah Partisi v Turkey, 31 July 2001).
To argue, as do the theonomic Reconstructionists (Rushdoony,
G. North, G. Bahnsen) that Scripture requires the substitution
of theocracy for democracy is absurd: prior to the return of
Christ to rule at the end of time, only fallen human beings (the
Theonomists themselves?) are available as God’s alleged
spokespersons.
Calvin’s Geneva, the English Commonwealth, and Puritan
New England have amply illustrated that democratic government, with all its failings, is to be preferred to rule by God’s
self-styled representatives.
Might not one argue that biblical standards of ethics and human
rights, even granting their existence, are of little consequence
since they do not cover all practical issues or resolve all ethical
difficulties: they still have to be applied, and self-centred humans will twist them to their own advantage even as they twist
the dictates of conscience and the natural law?
But the fact that biblical pronouncements are already in propositional form means that they are far less subject to misinterpretation and perversion than the unwritten law of nature and the
cries of conscience.
Since the latter are not in propositional form, they must undergo formulation before they can be used; this additional step
opens the door to further potential slips between cup and lip.
And: better to have sixty-six books of absolute principles, even
though they do not cover everything, than no revelational articulation of ethical principles at all.
And: we have already dealt with the issue of the clarity and perspicuity of Scripture, observing that its declarations are sufficiently precise that avoiding them is not easy.
And: the existence of an objective body of revelational literature means that when a bizarre interpretation is offered which
would dull the edge of scriptural morality (e.g., attempts to justify racism by isolated Bible quotations), the matter is open to
correction by a vast number of past and present students of the
Sacred Writings.
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How much more satisfactory this is when compared with the
subjective difficulties attendant on obtaining ethical guidance
from conscience or the natural law.
Can it not also be objected that biblical principles themselves
may be in conflict in a fallen world, and so do not solve all ethical dilemmas?
For example, the scriptural prohibition against lying, in conflict
with the biblical requirement to assist one’s neighbour; as when
the Nazi arrives at the door asking, “Are their any Jews here?,”
and you are hiding them to prevent their being taken to death
camps (Corrie Ten Boom).
Such ethical difficulties are not assisted by convoluted attempts
to establish a hierarchy of ethical principles in Scripture, allegedly permitting one to violate “lower” ones whilst holding to
“higher” ones—and thereby avoid sinning.
“Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one
point, is guilty of all” (James 2:10).
The prime purpose of the law, as we shall see later, is not to
make possible our “pulling out a plum and saying, ‘What a
good boy am I’”: it is rather to remind us of our fallen condition, so as to drive us to the Cross for the only forgiveness possible.
We are, therefore, in the rare instances of such conflicts, to “sin
bravely and go to the Cross bravely” (Luther).
In the hiding place incident, this means evaluating, by the general sweep of biblical teaching, the relative damage to be done
by lying to Nazis versus turning Jews over to almost certain
death; the conclusion (one fervently hopes) will be exceedingly
persuasive lying, followed by fervent admission at the Cross of
one’s involvement in a tragically sinful world.
The ethical difficulties in these boundary situations arise not
from a deficiency in the ethical teachings of the Bible (after all,
both refusing to assist your neighbour and lying are clearly
wrong!): their source lies in the hopelessly messy world we
ourselves have produced owing to our individual and corporate
sinfulness.
To choose the “lesser of evils” is not to fall into situation ethics.
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The situationist never experiences a conflict of principles, for
she recognises no principles in ethical decision-making (only
“love,” which, as we have seen, remains undefined and subjectively capable of alignment with virtually any moral interpretation).
The biblical ethicist, however, is faced with conflicting principles, revealed as absolute by Scripture, which in an unfallen
world would not be in conflict at all; her problem is to conform
as fully to God’s will as the human catastrophe will allow, and
at the same time to seek forgiveness for her Adamic and personal contribution to that catastrophe.
The provision of absolute ethical guidelines in Holy Writ does
not turn a broken world into the land of Oz, but it does provide
the only solid basis for an individual and societal ethic which
overcomes the relativity of human opinion as to standards of
right and wrong.
5.9
The most serious deterrent to ethical conduct and to the acceptance of human dignity is not the secular absence of principles per se but the lack of motivation to do good: here, only
the Christian message offers a sound solution.
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Plato, on the basis of his positive view of human nature, believed that knowledge alone would produce goodness—that if
we know what is right, we will do it.
We have already seen the centrality of that conviction to the rationalistic tradition (Kant, the neo-Kantians, et al.).
Rousseau (Emile), in line with Plato’s maieutic belief that
knowledge is inherent in mankind and that the teacher needs
only to assist its birth (as a midwife brings forth a child from
the pregnant mother), held that pupils should be allowed unlimited choice to achieve maximal educational development.
John Dewey and the so-called progressive education movement operated essentially with this philosophy of education.
The results of maieutic rationalism have not been encouraging.
A French nobleman of Rousseau’s time declared: “I have assiduously followed the precepts of Emile in the education of my
son; he has just reached his majority—and he is an imbecile.”
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Two generations of American and British beneficiaries of progressive education can neither spell nor write decent English.
Psychoanalytic theory, whatever its particular manifestation
(Freud, Adler, Jung, Horney, Lacan) insists that, below the
level of the conscious mind, there lies a dark unconscious, and
that the will is very often influenced far more by it than by rational considerations.
Query: How does a psychoanalyst differ from a coal miner?
Answer: The psychoanalyst goes down deeper, stays down
longer, and comes up dirtier.
Biblical revelation declares that the fallen creature’s fundamental problem is a lack of motivation to do what is right (indeed, a penchant to do what is wrong), even when she
rationally knows the truth and the difference between right and
wrong.
“The devils believe [in one God]” (James 2).
“The good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not,
that I do” (Romans 7).
The provision of absolute revelational standards of ethics is
therefore a necessary but not a sufficient condition of individual and social morality.
Such standards must be accompanied by a mechanism to
change human hearts so that they will indeed “love the neighbour as themselves.”
The claim, in Marxism and in liberal Western social reform, to
achieve such a change by altering the means of production or
by improving the external environment, has never produced the
desired effects.
Marxists, in spite of their high ideals, and because of their false
beliefs—“the end justifies the means,” etc.—have committed
horrendous human rights violations.
Western social reformers have replaced slums with better housing and have then seen that housing turned into new slums, owing to the fact that the value systems of the occupants remain
the same.
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Educational programmes in prisons often produce more educated and well-trained criminals.
It follows that, as the aphorism puts it, “What the world needs
is not more good advice, but Good News.”
The New Testament word for Gospel (euangelion) means, literally, “good news.”
Christian faith offers not merely the finest moral example—Jesus Christ himself—but also the possibility of redemption and
a genuine change of motivation (“conversion”) so that Jesus’
example can be followed in practice (1 Peter 2:21).
“Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. If the Son shall
make you free, you shall be free indeed” (John 8).
“If any person is in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are
passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5; cf. H. Drummond).
The mechanism of new creaturehood is the presence of God the
Holy Spirit in the believer’s heart: “He [the Holy Spirit] shall
glorify me [Christ], for he shall receive of mine, and shall show
it unto you” (John 16).
The result: the Christian believer becomes a “little Christ to his
neighbour” (Luther; cf. George Forell, Faith Active in Love).
God’s grace in Christ touches the world at the point of the redeemed sinner, spreading out from her to those whose wounds
need to be bound up.
At the same time, “no Christian is more than one day old” (Kierkegaard).
Since the believer remains simul justus et peccator—justified
and yet still a sinner—it is essential that she return to the Cross
continually.
Perfection is not attainable in this life (pace Wesley and his
“Holiness” followers).
Those who believe that they have attained perfection have either (1) lowered God’s standards to their own condition, or (2)
unrealistically inflated the moral quality of their inner and outer
conduct.
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Granting all the deficiencies in the walk of Christians, one must
agree with the empirical evidence that they have been more responsible for ameliorating social evils than has any other group
in human history (K. S. Latourette).
Christians have motivated, inter alia, the first orphans’ homes
and hospices, the Red Cross, the abolition of slavery, the elevation of women, charity in general, literacy and public education, the common and civil law traditions, the modern
university, etc., etc. (A. J. Schmidt).
We conclude, therefore, that both in theory and in practice,
transcendent Christian revelation provides the only justifiable
answers to the ultimate questions of ethics and human worth.
6
The Christian revelation satisfies the deepest general
and particular longings of the human heart.
6.1
On the personal level, human beings long to attain:
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A sound value system;
An integrated personality;
Genuine fellowship;
The assurance that life has purpose;
Ultimate fulfillment.
6.2
For a value system to be sound, it must be true.
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For it to be true, it must derive from a transcendent source (as
we have seen).
It follows that Christian revelation offers the only value system
which can, even in principle, satisfy epistemological requirements.
To choose any other value system is to choose the ideological
product of fallible, tainted, fallen humanity; such value systems, though they may contain useful elements, will necessarily partake of the qualities of their origin.
False value system are idolatrous, and idols never satisfy.
“Every founder is confounded by the graven image: for his
molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them. They
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are vanity, the work of errors: in the time of their visitation they
shall perish” (Jeremiah 10, 51).
“What profits the graven image that the maker thereof has
graven it; the molten image, and a teacher of lies, that the maker
of his work trusts therein, to make dumb idols? Woe unto him
that says to the wood, Awake; to the dumb stone, Arise, it shall
teach!” (Habakkuk 2).
6.3
Depth psychology and religious phenomenology reinforce the
biblical claim that only God’s way of salvation can provide
the integrated personality for which we seek.
6.31
Lacan, though heavily dependent on Freud, nonetheless saw
the self-centred heart of the fallen human condition.
He speaks of the ne rien vouloir savoir—the analysand’s refusal at all costs to face both her psychological condition and
the mechanisms she employs to retain and cultivate those neuroses which are destroying her.
Carl Gustav Jung offers valuable insight into the universal
needs of mankind and the necessary conditions for meeting
them.
Jung’s analytical work led him to reject Freud’s reductionist
materialism: the latter’s attempt to explain all human motivation by way of the libido (the life-urge) or the mortido (the
death-wish).
Jung identified, across the human landscape (from the physical
liturgies of ancient alchemists to the dreams of contemporary
businessmen and Zurich bankers), the existence of a common
psychic life consisting of universal symbolic patterns, the “archetypes of the collective unconscious.”
“Mythological research calls them ‘motifs’; in the psychology
of primitives they correspond to Lévy-Bruhl’s concept of
‘représentations collectives,’ and in the field of comparative religion they have been defined by Hubert and Mauss as ‘categories of the imagination.’ Adolf Bastian long ago called them
‘elementary’ or ‘primordial thoughts’” (Jung).
Archetypes include the Old Wise Man (a God symbol), the
Earth Mother, the Persona (the social mask behind which
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dwells the true ego), the Shadow (one’s infantile, dark side),
etc.
Jung saw the human being as a fractured personality needing a
conjunctio oppositorum: her brokenness healed, her fractured
psychic elements rejoined
Healing—“individuation” in Jungian terminology—is possible
through redemptive “symbols of transformation,” chief of
which is the Cross (for Jung, understood psychologically, to be
sure).
In recognising valid psychoanalytical insights concerning human motivation we need not, and do not, commit ourselves to
psychological determinism—with all its difficulties as set forth
earlier.
Religious phenomenologists such as Mircea Eliade have discovered Jungian archetypal patterns in the most widely diversified primitive and sophisticated religions.
Describing one such pattern, Eliade writes: “At the ‘beginning’
as well as at the ‘end’ of the religious history or Man, we find
the same ‘yearning for Paradise.’ If we take into account the
fact that the ‘yearning for Paradise’ is equally discernible in the
general religious attitude of early man we have the right to assume that the mystical memory of a blessedness without history haunts man from the moment he becomes aware of his
situation in the cosmos.”
These common psychic patterns cannot be explained away as
the product of cultural borrowing; they evidently “bubble up”
from the depths of the human consciousness, regardless of race
or geography.
What the patterns make clear is that your inner needs are essentially the same as my inner needs—and those of the human race
as a whole—and that those needs are the very ones for which
biblical religion offers a solution.
Over against existentialism and postmodernism, which, like
Leibniz, view each individual as a “monad without windows,”
it becomes evident that when I tell you my story, you are listening to your own story.
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6.4
Common myths and folktales of the world manifest fundamental archetypal patterns and offer literary reinforcement to
the scriptural picture of man as a creature in need of salvation.
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There is an “astounding similarity between myths collected in
widely different regions” of the world (C. Lévi-Strauss).
The commonality of motifs in the world’s folktales is demonstrated by Stith Thompson’s Motif-Index of Folk-Literature.
On analysing recurrent mythical themes in fifty cultures on the
basis of Murdock’s “world ethnographic sample,” Kluckhohn
and Moench found one of the most common myths to be the archetype of the Flood—in which, by grace, a few are saved from
global catastrophe.
In the common folktale of “Sleeping Beauty,” a Princess is put
into a deathlike trance by the machinations of an evil Witch;
impenetrable brambles grow up around the Princess’s castle;
and all is restored only when, in fulfillment of a prophecy, a
Prince comes and raises her up with the kiss of love; this is followed by a marriage feast and the declaration that “they lived
happily ever after.”
The Princess = the human race; the Witch = the devil; the
Prince = Christ.
Incorporated into this tale is the Fall of man, with its consequences for the entire physical world; the act of transcendent,
divine redemption; and the marriage supper of the Lamb at the
end of time.
It will be observed that, being “dead,” the Princess cannot save
herself, nor can anyone in the castle save her, since they are immobilised along with her; salvation must (and does) come from
outside the world represented by the castle.
Noteworthy also is the fact that folktales begin with the timeless formula, “Once upon a time . . .” (“Il y a une fois . . .”); the
Gospel story—which fulfils them—commences in real history
with the words, “And it came to pass in those days that there
went out a decree from Caesar Augustus . . .”
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“I was by now too experienced in literary criticism to regard the
Gospels as myths. They had not the mythical taste. And yet the
very matter which they set down in their artless, historical fashion—those narrow, unattractive Jews, too blind to the mythical
wealth of the Pagan world around them—was precisely the
matter of the great myths. If ever a myth had become fact, had
been incarnated, it would be just like this. Myths were like it in
one way. Histories were like it in another. But nothing was simply like it. And no person was like the Person it depicted; as
real, as recognisable, through all that depth of time, as Plato’s
Socrates or Boswell’s Johnson (ten times more so than Eckermann’s Goethe or Lockhart’s Scott), yet also numinous, lit by
a light from beyond the world, a god. But if a god—we are no
longer polytheists—then not a god, but God. Here and here
only in all time the myth must become fact; the Word, flesh;
God, Man. This is not ‘a religion,’ nor ‘a philosophy.’ It is the
summing up and actuality of them all” (C. S. Lewis).
“The Gospels contain . . . a story of a larger kind which embraces all the essence of fairy-stories. They contain many marvels—peculiarly artistic, beautiful, and moving; ‘mythical’ in
their perfect, self-contained significance; and at the same time
powerfully symbolic and allegorical; and among the marvels is
the greatest and most complete conceivable eucatastrophe. The
Birth of Christ is the eucatastrophe of Man’s history. The Resurrection is the eucatastrophe of the story of the Incarnation.
This story begins and ends in joy. It has pre-eminently the ‘inner consistency of reality.’ There is no tale ever told that men
would rather find was true, and none which so many sceptical
men have accepted as true on its own merits. For the Art of it
has the supremely convincing tone of Primary Art, that is, of
Creation. To reject it leads either to sadness or to wrath.
“It is not difficult to imagine the peculiar excitement and
joy that one would feel, if any specially beautiful fairy-story
were found to be ‘primarily’ true, its narrative to be history,
without thereby necessarily losing the mythical or allegorical
significance that it had possessed. . . . The joy would have exactly the same quality, if not the same degree, as the joy which
the ‘turn’ in a fairy-story gives: such has the very taste of pri-
189
6.441
6.4411
6.44111
6.44112
6.45
mary truth. (Otherwise its name would not be joy.) It looks forward (or backward: the direction in this regard is unimportant)
to the Great Eucatastrophe. The Christian joy, the Gloria, is of
the same kind; but it is pre-eminently (infinitely, if our capacity
were not finite) high and joyous. Because this story is supreme;
and it is true. Art has been verified. God is the Lord, of angels,
and of men—and of elves. Legend and History have met and
fused” (J. R. R. Tolkien).
“The direction is unimportant”: and so those in Old Testament
times, such as Abraham, who looked forward to Messiah’s
coming, were saved by him though the Incarnation occurred
much later (Romans 4; Hebrews 11).
And: we may legitimately speculate that “God our Saviour,
who would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2; cf. 2 Peter 3) may offer at the
moment of death an opportunity to accept or reject Christ to
those who, through no fault of their own, were unable to hear
or understand his word during their earthly lives.
But since “no person comes to the Father but through Christ”—
according to Jesus’ own words (John 14)—the claim that anyone can be saved simply by “living according to one’s best
lights” is utterly wrong, even when this belief is set forth as official teaching by a church body.
Nor does it follow that a “second chance” is given to those who
reject the Saviour in this world (Hebrews 9:27).
The combined weight of psychology and the mythopoeic confirms Augustine’s declaration that “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee.”
6.5
Biblical revelation describes the human problem in terms far
more specific—and far starker—than do the best psychological and literary analyses.
6.51
6.511
6.512
6.513
6.514
According to the Bible, the entire fallen race suffers from:
Sin;
Death;
The devil; and
The law.
190
6.52
6.53
6.531
6.54
6.541
6.542
6.55
6.551
6.56
6.57
6.58
6.581
“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: there is
none that understands, there is none that seeks after God. They
are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that does good, no, not one” (Romans 3;
Psalms 14 and 53).
“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6).
“To sleep! perchance to dream; ay, there’s the rub; / For in that
sleep of death what dreams may come, / When we have shuffled off this moral coil, / Must give us pause” (Shakespeare,
Hamlet).
“Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Timothy 5).
It is often a poor excuse to say, “The devil made me do it”: but
not always.
Powerful empirical evidence has been collected as to the effects of occultic and demonic activity (e.g., K. Koch, Seelsorge
und Okultismus).
“The law works wrath: for where there is no law, there is no
transgression” (Romans 4).
Law—whether exterior or interior, secular or religious—reminds us that we always fall short of ideal standards.
Like Bunyan’s Pilgrim, we carry a horrendous weight upon our
back, and neither we ourselves nor any of our fellow sufferers
can remove it from us.
Like Sisyphus, we struggle up the mountain of secular solutions for the human dilemma, only to find that the rock of our
misery has rolled back down again, leaving us exactly where
we were before.
Like the architects of the Tower of Babel, not only do we not
reach heaven in spite of our best efforts, but our exhausting labours leave us worse off than we were before, with our language more and more confused (Genesis 11).
“All philosophy is a ‘critique of language’” (Wittgenstein,
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 4.0031).
191
6.6
The biblical answer to the quest for an integrated personality
centres on the truth that wholeness is impossible without a
personal recognition of the true problem and an acceptance
of the transcendental solution for it.
6.61
No-one will take a remedy unless she is convinced that she is
suffering from a malady.
“They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are
sick” (Jesus, in Matthew 9).
And no-one will pay a physician if she thinks that she can cure
herself.
Here, the proper distinction between law and gospel is critical.
“The difference between the Law and the Gospel is the height
of knowledge in Christendom. Every person and all persons
who assume or glory in the name of Christ should know and be
able to state this difference” (Luther, WA, 36, 25).
Law tells us what we should do; gospel tells us what God has
graciously done for us when we could not help ourselves.
“By ‘Law,’ we should understand nothing but God’s Word and
command by which he tells us what we are to do and not to do
and demands our obedience or work. . . . The Gospel is such a
doctrine or Word of God as does not demand our works or command us to do anything but bids us simply receive the offered
grace of the forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation and be satisfied to have it given to us as a free gift” (Luther, WA, 30-31).
To attempt to save oneself by a vain attempt to fulfil the law is
to absorb gospel into law; to think that gospel allows one to dispense with the law is to absorb law into gospel.
The latter fallacy was well characterised by Bonhoeffer as the
manifestation of “cheap grace.”
Properly distinguishing law from gospel is essential to “rightly
dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2), i.e., correctly understanding the biblical message of salvation.
Worrying about the presence of an item numbered 6.66 is an affront to biblical eschatology.
“The Word of God is not rightly divided when sinners who
have been struck down and terrified by the Law are directed,
6.611
6.62
6.63
6.631
6.64
6.641
6.65
6.651
6.66
6.6601
6.661
192
6.662
6.663
6.67
6.671
6.6711
6.672
6.6721
not to the Word and the Sacraments, but to tbeir own prayers
and wrestlings with God in order that they may win their way
into a state of grace; in other words, when they are told to keep
on praying and struggling until they feel that God has received
them into grace” (C. F. W. Walther, Thesis IX).
“The Word of God is not rightly divided when one makes an
appeal to believe in a manner as if a person could make himself
believe or at least help towards that end, instead of preaching
faith into a person’s heart by laying the Gospel promises before
him” (Walther, Thesis XIII).
“The Word of God is not rightly divided when the preacher
tries to make people believe that they are truly converted as
soon as they have become rid of certain vices and engage in
certain works of piety and virtuous practises” (Walther, Thesis
XVI).
“What must I do to be saved? Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ
and you shall be saved” (Acts 16).
The Greek text in such passages employs the preposition eis
(“into”), where the translations use merely “in” or “on”; the
point of the original wording is that belief in not simply a matter of intellectual assent but of entering into a personal relationship with the Christ who saves.
The same point is made by the classical dogmaticians when
they distinguish between notitia (faith as intellectual knowledge of the truth) and assensus (faith as the individual’s formal
assent to truth) on the one hand, and fiducia (faith as personal,
saving trust in Christ) on the other (Gerhard, Chemnitz, Quenstedt).
Why does personal trust in Christ save? Because only he can
atone for the sinful self-centredness of a fallen race.
As a human being, he was able to serve as genuine representative of all mankind; as true God, he could sacrificially take the
sins of the entire race on himself, receive the death penalty
those sins had merited, and thereby free us from the judgment
we richly deserved (cf. Anselm, Cur Deus Homo?; D.
Chytraeus, De sacrificiis).
193
6.67211
6.67212
6.6722
6.67221
6.6723
6.68
6.681
6.682
6.683
6.69
194
But this gift will not be forced on those who think that they do
not need it or suppose that they can save themselves.
A cheque, even if drawn on a solvent bank account, will do the
recipient no good if he refuses to cash it, believing that it is of
no value to him.
As God almighty come to earth, only Christ could conquer the
evil powers arrayed against fallen humanity (cf. Aulén, Christus Victor).
“The King of all . . . has come into our country and dwelt in one
body amidst the many, and in consequence the designs of the
enemy against mankind have been foiled, and the corruption of
death, which formerly held them in its power, has ceased to be”
(Athanasius, De incarnatione Verbi Dei).
“You cannot call Christ redeemer without calling him God—
for a man cannot save you” (Wittgenstein, Denkbewegungen:
Tagebücher [2000 ed.], para. 145).
The law has three functions, but Luther was entirely correct
that its chief use is that of “schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.”
“The Law has three uses, the Political, the Elenchtico-pedagogical, and the Didactic. By the Political use is meant the use of
the law as a curb to hold in check wicked men, and to protect
society against their aggressions. By the Elenchtico-pedagogical use is meant its use to convict men of sin and thus indirectly
to lead them to Christ (Gal. 3:24). This use of the Law refers
primarily to the unconverted. But there is an Elenchtico-pedagogical use of the Law even for the regenerate, inasmuch as the
Christian’s life should be a daily repentance, and the law enables him to see his daily shortcomings and his need of Christ
more and more clearly. The Didactic use of the law is its use as
a guide for the Christian mind and conduct” (J. Stump).
The word translated “schoolmaster” in Galatians 3:24 is paidagogos, which referred not to a teacher as such, but to the slave
who brought the child to his teacher.
Lex semper accusat; but
“Him who comes to me [Jesus] I will in no wise cast out” (John
6).
6.7
Genuine fellowship requires mutual respect and love, cemented by a common value system.
6.71
Mutual respect is present where those involved are willing to
take themselves as they really are, without pretence of being
more than they really are.
Only the gospel makes it possible for humans to see themselves
as God sees them: sinners saved by grace.
Only the gospel makes it possible to love the unlovely, since
“we love because he [God in Christ] first loved us.”
The higher the common values, the better the fellowship.
In principle, therefore, the church should offer the best possibility for genuine fellowship.
The church exists where “the gospel is rightly preached and the
sacraments are administered in accordance with it” (Augsburg
Confession, Art. 7).
The gospel is expressly defined in biblical revelation as: “that
by which you are being saved if you keep it in remembrance . .
. how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures,
and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15).
To make “obedience” a mark of the church is to confuse law
and gospel.
But not to discipline false doctrine in the church is to defeat the
very reason for its existence; indeed, a church which cannot
identify and root out heresy is a church which no longer understands orthodoxy.
The presence of false teaching per se does not make a church
apostate, since human teachers will never be perfect; what does
constitute apostasy is the unwillingness of a church to discipline false teaching once it has been recognised as such.
The outward form and organisation of the church (whether “established” or “free”) must be seen as secondary to its central
purpose, which is to “preach the gospel to every creature”—to
“teach all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”
The purpose of the church is not fellowship per se.
6.72
6.73
6.74
6.741
6.75
6.751
6.752
6.753
6.754
6.76
6.761
195
6.762
6.763
6.764
6.77
6.771
6.772
6.773
6.774
6.78
6.781
196
The church is neither a spiritual Rotary Club, Alcoholics’
Anonymous, nor Moose Lodge.
The church is not primarily an organisation for the amelioration
of societal woes.
If the church does its proper business, namely, the preaching of
the gospel for the salvation of souls, the inevitable byproducts
of this operation will be fellowship within and societal amelioration without.
Historic, liturgical churches have the great advantage of maximally benefiting from the spiritual heritage and experiences of
believers through the ages.
But, even when a church is poverty-stricken in its forms of worship and less than ideal in its governmental structure, the Christian’s evaluation of it must in the last analysis be positive
insofar as it is preaching the gospel.
“Notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretense or in truth
Christ is preached, therein I do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice”
(Philippians 1).
Rejoicing does not, of course, necessitate personal attendance
where the style of worship sets (so to speak) the children’s teeth
on edge.
Christians are “not to forsake the assembling of themselves together” (Hebrews 10), but, fortunately, one can—and should—
choose the assembly which best reflects the totality of Christian
experience and most fully proclaims “the whole counsel of
God” (Acts 20).
Ecclesiolae in ecclesiis are to be discouraged, for they can fragment the church; but the special relationships of believers
whose spiritual objectives and concerns are identical can be a
foretaste of heaven.
Thus J. V. Andreae’s ideal of the Societas Christiana; thus, the
Oxford Inklings; and thus the dedication of this book.
6.8
Christianity provides the only verifiable assurance that life
has eternal purpose.
6.81
“Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one of
them is forgotten before God? But even the very hairs of your
head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: you are of more
value than many sparrows” (Jesus in Luke 12 and Matthew 10).
Without this assurance from the Christ who himself made all
things (John 1, Colossians 1), we would have no reason to think
that our minute lives on a minute planet in a minute solar system were worth anything cosmically.
Hobbes, from his atheistic perspective, accurately described
human life as “nasty, poor, brutish and short.”
Joe (of Show Boat) touchingly expresses the misery of pointless human existence: “Ah gets weary an’ sick of tryin’, / Ah’m
tired of livin’ an’ skeered of dyin’, / But Ol’ man river he jus’
keeps rollin’ along” (Oscar Hammerstein II).
But we are assured that “all things work together for good to
them that love God, to them who are the called according to his
purpose” (Romans 8).
This means that, for believers, God brings the best out of every
situation in their lives.
God does not override their freewill, and they are subject to the
consequences of their sins; but God in his providence makes
sure that the end results are maximised for their good.
This point of theodicy is sensitively made by novelist Thornton
Wilder in The Bridge of San Luis Rey and, more especially, The
Eighth Day.
Wittgenstein “perceived the possibility of religious belief” in
contemplating the state of mind in which one says, “I am safe,
nothing can injure me whatever happens” (cf. Psalm 23). He
“thought that ‘the experience of absolute safety’ was connected
with the idea of ‘feeling safe in the hands of God’” (Norman
Malcolm).
No such promise is provided for those who do not love God.
Their lives operate purposelessly—both in time and in eternity.
6.82
6.821
6.822
6.83
6.831
6.832
6.8321
6.8322
6.84
6.841
197
6.85
6.86
Voltaire (Candide) rightly lampooned Leibniz’s claim that
macrocosmically this is “the best of all possible worlds”; but,
for the Christian believer, microcosmically, that is precisely
what it is.
It is hard to imagine a greater reason to accept the gift of salvation offered by a God who went to the Cross to provide it for us.
6.9
The validated Christian message assures us of ultimate fulfillment.
6.901
The fairy tales of the world attest our deepest desire to “live
happily ever after.”
Even in this life, after his appalling miseries, Job’s “latter end
was blessed by the Lord more than his beginning” (Job 42).
“Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life: he who believes
in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whoever lives
and believes in me shall never die” (John 11).
How vacuous humanist consolations such as genetic immortality (“Your children are your future”)!
“And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the
tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and
they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them,
and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their
eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things
are passed away” (Revelation 21).
For the believer, the “inside” of Narnia is far greater than the
“outside,” and no good thing shall ever ultimately be lost (C. S.
Lewis).
“Paradise is somewhere and not anywhere, is something and
not anything. And I would not be so very much surprised if the
house in heaven had a real green lamp-post after all” (G. K.
Chesterton).
Judgment at the end of time assures us that all wrongs will be
righted and that the Mengeles of this world will not finally “get
away with it.”
6.91
6.92
6.921
6.93
6.94
6.941
6.95
198
6.951
6.96
6.961
6.9611
6.962
6.97
“In a conversation between Drury and Wittgenstein in 1949,
Drury had mentioned a doctrine of Origen, according to which
‘at the end of time there would be a final restitution of all
things. That even Satan and the fallen angels would be restored
to their former glory.’ Drury then added that this conception
‘was at once condemned as heretical.’ Wittgenstein replied:
‘Of course it was rejected. It would make nonsense of everything else. If what we do now is to make no difference in the
end, then all the seriousness of life is done away with’” (Norman Malcolm).
All of these promises rest on the solid, factual foundation of Jesus’ historical Incarnation: they represent mankind’s deepest
longings, but, far from being mere “wish-fulfillment,” they
constitute God’s loving realisation of his purposes for us established before the foundation of the world.
True, we do not—indeed, cannot—have direct evidence of eschatological truths, but we have the assurance of Jesus, who
conquered death.
Verification can be analogised to the construction of a building:
one does not need, and it would be irrational to demand, supports under every portion of the roof; what is required is sufficient support, e.g., under each of the roof’s four corners (W.
Van Orman Quine).
On the basis of verifiable divine revelation, represented by the
living and the written Word, we may have confidence in an ultimate and most certain fulfillment of human life.
“Honour and thanks to God
Who wrought this world’s creation,
To taste of heavenly joy
In death and tribulation.
Him praise we while we live,
And on his will attend,
Until we there arrive
Where song shall have no end.”
--J. S. Bach
199
6.98
“As bright the star of morning gleams,
So Jesus sheddeth glorious beams
Of light and consolation.
Thy word, O Lord,
Radiance darting,
Truth imparting
Gives salvation;
Thine be praise and adoration!”
--F. Mendelssohn, after Ph. Nicolai
6.99
“From the Throne of His Cross, the King of grief
Cries out to a world of unbelief:
Oh! men and women, afar and nigh,
Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?
O come unto Me—this awful price,
Redemption’s tremendous sacrifice—
Is paid for you—Oh, why will ye die?
Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?”
--W. J. Sparrow-Simpson, libretto to Stainer’s Crucifixion
7
200
Whereof one can speak, thereof one must not be silent.
INDEX OF BIBLICAL REFERENCES*
Gen. 1
Gen. 1:1
Gen. 1 and 2
Gen. 2
Gen. 3:15-19
Gen. 6-9
Gen. 11
Gen. 42:16, 20
Gen. 49:10-11
4.732
4.73212
4.7321
4.271
4.81
4.75
6.58
2.38412
4.12222
2 Sam. 11-12
5.83
1 Ki. 8:26
1 Ki. 22:16,
22 ff.
2.38412
2.38412
1 Chron. 6:67
5.83
Ezra 7:26
5.83
Ex. 3:14
Ex. 12:49
Ex. 20:8-11
Ex. 20:13
Ex. 20:16
Ex. 21:2
Ex. 21:13
Ex. 22:9
3.53
5.83
5.83
5.83
5.83
5.83
5.83
5.83
Job 38-42
Job 42:12
4.8835
6.91
Lev. 23:22
Lev. 24:22
Lev. 25:14-18,
25-34
5.83
5.83
Ps. 14
Ps. 23
Ps. 51:5
Ps. 53
Ps. 53:3
Ps. 82:6
Ps. 119:163
3.8646, 6.52
6.8322
5.83
3.8646, 6.52
4.8821
4.2411
2.38412
Prov. 14:25
Prov. 24:23
2.38412
5.83
Num. 9:14
Num. 15:15-16
Num. 33:54
5.83
5.83
5.83
Deut. 6:4
Deut. 6:7
Deut. 8:3
Deut. 11:19
Deut. 16:19
Deut. 18:22
Deut. 23:25-26
Deut. 24:6, 10,
12-13, 15
3.555
5.83
4.252
5.83
5.83
2.38412
5.83
Isa. 1:16-17
Isa. 7:14
Isa. 9
Isa. 14:12-15
Isa. 43:9
Isa. 45:23
Isa. 53:6
5.83
4.1224
4.12222
4.811
5.83
3.951
4.8821
Jer. 10:15.
Jer. 31:15
6.241
4.1225
5.83
Ezek., Book of
Ezek. 26 & 28
3.511
4.121
Josh. 10
Josh. 20:1
4.76
5.83
Dan. 2:9
Dan. 7:13
Dan. 9:24-27
2.38412
3.51
4.1221
1 Sam. 8
5.843
5.83
* Prepared by Craig Parton, Esq., with the author’s deep appreciation.
201
Hos. 11:1-5
4.1225
Amos 5:12
Amos 9:7
5.83
5.83
Mic. 5:2-5
4.1223
Nah. 1:9
5.83
Hab. 2:18,19
6.242
Zech. 8:16
Zech. 11:12-13
2.38412
4.1226
Mal. 2:9
Mal. 3:1
5.83
3.551
Matt., Book of
Matt. 1:21
Matt. 4:1-11
Matt. 5
Matt. 5:18
Matt. 5:21-22
Matt. 5:45
Matt. 9:12
Matt. 10:29
Matt. 10:29-31
Matt. 11:2-6
Matt. 12:38
Matt. 12:39-41
Matt. 12:40
Matt. 13:44-46
Matt. 16:15
Matt. 16:16-18
Matt. 16:18
Matt. 18
Matt. 19:4-6
Matt. 19:17
Matt. 20:19
Matt. 20:25-28
Matt. 20:28
Matt. 21:33-44
Matt. 24:37
Matt. 28:18-20
3.52
2.384131, 3.521
4.252
4.262
4.241
5.83
5.83
6.611
2.4621
6.81
3.8211
4.273
4.6411
2.9331, 3.68
5.81
3.98
2.384131
4.332121
3.522
4.271
3.54
3.68
5.845
3.522
4.8832
4.272
3.523, 3.741
Mk. 1:12
Mk. 2:5-10
Mk. 6
4.252
3.51
3.4452
202
Mk. 9:31
Mk. 10:6-9
Mk. 10:34
Mk. 10:42-45
Mk. 10:45
Mk. 12:1-11
Mk. 13:32
Mk. 14:62
3.68
4.271
3.68
5.845
3.522
4.8832
3.54
3.512
Lk. 1:15, 41
Lk. 4:1-13
Lk. 6:45
Lk. 10:7
Lk. 12:6-7
Lk. 15 and 18
Lk. 18:33
Lk. 20:9-18
Lk. 24
Lk. 24:7
Lk. 24:27
5.83
4.252
5.83
5.83
6.81
3.522
3.68
4.8832
3.62301, 3.63412
3.68
4.243
Jn., Book of
Jn. 1:1
4.7331
Jn. 1:1-3
Jn. 2:19
Jn. 3:12
Jn. 5:21-32 ff.
Jn. 5:39
Jn. 6:37
Jn. 7:17
Jn. 8:34, 36
Jn. 8:44
Jn. 8:46
Jn. 8:58
Jn. 10:30
Jn. 10:34
Jn. 11:25-26
Jn. 14:6
Jn. 14:8-9
Jn. 14:8-10
Jn. 14:16
Jn. 14:26
Jn. 16:13
Jn. 16:14-15
Jn. 17:7
Jn. 20
Jn. 20:28
3.53, 3.8211
3.534, 3.85411,
6.82
3.68
4.6111
2.38412
4.242, 4.971
6.69
5.83
5.981
3.4432
2.38412
2.9331, 3.531
3.742
4.2411
3.765, 6.92
1.981, 6.44111
3.742, 3.82
3.532
3.743
4.312
4.311
5.9821
4.851
2.9331, 3.62302
3.533
Indexes
Jn. 21
Jn. 21:24
3.62301
2.38412
Acts 1:1-3
Acts 1:3, 9
Acts 1:21-22
Acts 2:22
Acts 4:12
Acts 5:29
Acts 9
Acts 10:34
Acts 12
Acts 13:9
Acts 16:30, 31
Acts 17:22-23,
30-31
Acts 20:27
Acts 24:8, 11
Acts 26:26
3.624
3.67653
4.421
3.4525
1.982, 3.552
5.842
4.41
5.83
3.44522
2.384131
6.67
Rom. 1:20
Rom. 3:10
Rom. 3:23
Rom. 4
Rom. 4:15
Rom. 5
Rom. 5:8
Rom. 5:12
Rom. 6:23
Rom. 7:19
Rom. 8:28
Rom. 12
Rom. 13
Rom. 14:11
3.872
6.52
4.742, 4.8821
6.441
6.55
1.421
4.8832, 4.893
4.84
6.53
5.942
4.8823, 6.83
5.82222
5.841
3.951
1 Cor. 3:11
1 Cor. 6:19-20
1 Cor. 11:29-30
1 Cor. 15:1-5
1 Cor. 15:3-6
1 Cor. 15:19
1 Cor. 15:22
4.332121
5.83
4.9353
6.751
3.624
3.611
1.421
2 Cor. 5:15
2 Cor. 5:17
2 Cor. 5:19
2 Cor. 11:14
1.5111
4.93121, 5.982
3.61
2.141
5.37
6.774
2.38412
3.6251
Gal. 2:11
Gal. 3:24
Gal. 3:28
4.411
6.681, 6.682
1.8212, 5.83
Eph. 4:25
Eph. 5:25
2.38412
1.8212
Phil. 1:18
Phil. 2:6-8
Phil. 2:10
6.772
3.7811
3.5531, 3.951
Col. 1:16-17
4.8831, 6.82
1 Thes. 3:11
3.5533
2 Thes. 1:7-8
2 Thes. 2:16
3.5532
3.5533
1 Tim. 1:15
1 Tim. 2:3, 4
1 Tim. 2:9
1 Tim. 5:8
1 Tim. 5:18
1 Tim. 5:21
2.38412
6.4411
5.83
5.83
5.83
5.83
2 Tim. 2:15
6.66
Heb. 9:27
Heb. 10:25
Heb. 11
Heb. 13:8
6.44112
6.774
6.441
2.48
Jas., Book of
Jas. 2:1-7
Jas. 2:10
Jas. 2:19
4.33211
5.83
5.8621
5.941
1 Pet. 2:21
1 P:et. 5:8
5.98
6.54
2 Pet. 1:16
2 Pet. 1:21
2 Pet. 3
2 Pet. 3:8
2 Pet. 3:15-16
3.4422
4.133
6.4411
4.732
4.43
1 Jn. 1:8
1 Jn. 4
4.8821
5.82222
203
1 Jn. 4:1-6
1 Jn. 4:8
1 Jn. 4:19
2.142
4.851
4.872, 6.73
Rev., Book of
Rev. 4
Rev. 12:9
Rev. 20:2
Rev. 21:3-4
Rev. 21 and 22
4.33211
4.34
4.811
4.811
6.93
4.8833
204
INDEX OF NAMES*
Readers checking the names of published authors in this Index will discover
that few appear in the text accompanied by bibliographical citations. Considering this author’s rigorous bibliographical style elsewhere, this may seem a
remarkable omission; and, indeed, the specific sources in many instances (but
certainly not in all) may be found by perusing the author’s other works (for a
list, consult: www.ciltpp.com). But to have provided the references here, in a
treatise of this special kind, would have been to invite the lazy and the unscrupulous to use the citations independently, out of their contextual connections.
Original sin being what it is, the references have therefore been purposely
omitted. This may remind some readers of Wittgenstein’s remark, in the Preface to his Tractatus: “I do not wish to judge how far my efforts coincide with
those of other philosophers. . . . I give no sources.”
Abraham
3.531; 3.843;
6.441
Abu Qurra
2.1733;
2.17343
Acton, Lord
5.2311
Adam
1.421;
2.384131; 4.271; 4.7112;
4.84; 4.841; 4.8411; 4.86;
5.8652
Adam, Karl
2.472
Adler
5.93
Adler, Mortimer
3.1262
Agrippa I
3.44522
Ahriman
1.41
Aland, Kurt
3.256
Albright, W. F.
3.2751
Alexander
1.228
“Alice”
3.1234
Althamer, A.
4.653
Altizer, Thomas J.J.
1.914; 2.14;
2.223
Ambrose, Alice
2.221
Anderson, Sir Norman 3.6224
Anderson, Sir Robert 4.1221
Andreae, J. V.
6.781
Anselm, St.
1.223; 3.84;
6.6721
Aquinas, St. Thomas 1.223; 3.811;
3.842; 5.311
Archer, G.
4.291; 4.653
Archimedes
5.73
Aristotle
1.222; 2.221;
2.2211; 2.22111; 2.353;
2.38411; 3.261; 3.74711;
3.842; 5.2821; 5.52
Arndt, W. F.
3.344431;
4.653
Arnolds, Edward
3.6232
Ashby, R..W.
2.9921
Asimov, Isaac
3.86271
Athanasius, St.
6.67221
Auden, W. H.
3.99
Augustine, St.
1.223;
1.8321; 4.332111; 4.652;
4.6553; 4.761; 4.821;
4.871; 5.311; 6.45
Augustus, Caesar
3.44521;
4.921; 6.4242
Aulén, Gustaf
6.6722
* Prepared by Prof. Dr Rod Rosenbladt, with the author’s deep appreciation.
205
Austin, John
2.38131;
2.38332; 2.384311
Ayer, A.J.
2.941
Bach, J.S.
5.2322; 6.97
Bacon, Sir Francis
2.721
Bacon, Lord
4.9325
Bahnson, Greg
5.8453
Baly, Denis
2.1743
Barnabus
4.44
Barth, Karl
2.174;
2.1741; 2.1744; 2.9725
Barzun, Jacques
3.11
Bastian, Adolph
6.3221
Bayes, Thomas
3.873
Beatty, Chester
3.2521;
3.344523
Bede, Venerable
3.941
Behe, Michael
3.8643
Benchley, Robert
2.32211
Bengel, J. A.
2.58
Bennett, E. H.
3.4441
Beyleveld, D.
5.623
Billerbeck, Paul
3.78511
Bird, W. R.
4.731
Black, Max
2.3501;
2.3524; Introduction
Black, Matthew
3.74312
Blackstone, William 5.311;
5.3111
Blaiklock, E. M.
3.4453
Blanshard, Brand
2.1744
Blinzler, Josef
3.4451
Bochenski, I. M.
2.2221
Bohr, Niels
2.32201
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich 6.651
Bornkamm, Guenter 4.941
Boswell, James
6.43
Boyd, Gregory
2.412
Bradbury, Ray
5.3411
Bradley, F. H.
2.9621
Braithwaite,
2.35213
Brightman, Edgar S. 1.227;
2.1834; 2.35233; 2.38432;
2.461; 4.802
Bruce, F. F.
3.4525
Buchanan, James
3.9
206
Buddha, Gautama
1.24; 1.41;
1.51; 1.5112; 1.61;
1.84131; 1.84132; 1.84133;
1.84134; 2.122
Bultmann, Rudolph
2.5; 3.2752;
4.941
Bunyan, John
6.56
Burrows, Sir Roland 4.93231
Burtt, Edwin A.
2.7; 2.71;
2.711; Introduction
Caesar, Julius
5.2212
Caesar, Tiberius
3.351
Calvin, Jean
4.761;
4.8501; 5.84531
Campbell, Joseph
1.11
Caplan, H.
3.3422
Carnap, Rudolf
2.3822;
2.3823; 2.38231
Carnell, Edward John 2.1834;
4.732
“Carton, Sidney”
4.893
Catullus
3.251;
3.2531
Ch’ang-tzu
2.9721
Chang, R. and M.S.
1.421
Chardin, Teilhard de 2.464; 2.472
Chemnitz, Martin
6.6711
Chesterton, G. K.
2.4901;
3.1184; 3.67122; 3.691;
3.8652; 6.941
Christ, Jesus
See Index of Subjects
Chytraeus, David
6.72
Cicero, M. T.
1.03;
3.74712; 3.86424
Coady, C. A. J.
3.412
Cobb, John B.
2.412;
2.4921
Cobb, John B.
2.4921
Cohen, Morris
3.121
Colwell, E. C.
3.534
Confucius
1.42; 1.8414;
1.84141
Conzelmann, Hans
4.941
Copernicus
2.111; 4.761
Coué, Emile
5.2251
Cox, Harvey
2.13
Indexes
Crews, Frederick C.
Cricket, Jiminy
Crowley, Aleister
Cullmann, O.
4.9412
5.35
2.143
4.31
Daly, C. B.
2.38321;
Introduction
Daniel
4.1221;
4.281; 4.6321
Daniken, von
3.6642;
3.66421
Darwin, Charles
5.313
David
4.1222
Davis, S. T.
3.651
Dawkins, Richard
3.861
De Gaulle, Charles
2.511
Dembski, William
3.86411
Dennis, John
3.34221
Denton, Michael
3.8643
Derrida, Jacques
2.5
Descartes, René
2.3231;
3.752
Devil, The
See Satan
Dewey, John
5.913
Dickens, Charles
4.893;
5.3511
Dio, Cassius
3.351
Divine, Father
2.122
Dobzhansky,
3.86441
Donne, John
4.88211
Drinkwater, John
3.3423
Drummond, H.
5.982
Drury, M. O’C.
6.951
Duchamp, Marcel
5.2231
Dworkin, Ronald
2.377
Earman, J.
3.6733,
3.8731
Ebeling, Gerhard
4.941
Eccles, Sir John
3.86441
Eckelmann, H. J.
4.732
Eckermann, Johann Peter
6.43
Edghill, E. A.
4.122
Einstein, Albert
2.3221;
2.3533; 2.7311; 3.6731;
3.6741
Eliade, Mircea
1.914; 6.34;
6.341
Emerson, Ralph W.
2.2323
Erasmus, Desiderius 3.252; 4.923
Erikson, Erik H.
2.671
Esther
4.281
Euclid
2.9321;
4.623
Eusebius
3.2731
Eve
4.271;
4.7112; 4.8411
Ezra
4.281
“Fagin”
5.3511
Fechner, G. T.
1.221
Feigl, Herbert
2.961
Feinberg, John S.
4.8412
Feinberg, Paul
2.3721
Feldman, A. Bronson 2.672
Feuerbach, Ludwig
5.232;
5.2322
Feynman, Richard P. 3.67233
Finnis, John
5.372;
5.3721
Fisher, J. T.
3.56121
Fletcher, Joseph
3.784; 5.42
Flew, Anthony
2.98; 3.674;
3.69; 3.8545; 3.86451
Ford, Henry
5.12
Forell, George
5.433; 5.99
Franklin, Benjamin
2.672
Frazer, James
1.832;
1.8321
Freud, Sigmund
2.6; 2.63;
2.66; 5.93; 6.31; 6.321
Friedmann, A.
3.8626
Friedrich, Carl
5.3311
Fuchs, Ernst
2.1716;
4.941
Fuller, D.
4.601
Fuller v Strum
3.3831
Funk, Robert
2.1716;
3.3722
Gautama Buddha
Gautama
Gerhard, Johann
Gewirth, Alan
5.623
Gibbons v Ogden
See Buddha,
6.6711
5.62; 5.622;
4.9324
207
Gibson, Lord Justice Peter
3.3831
Gish, Duane
4.731
Givens, R. A.
3.451
Gluckman, Max
3.12511
Gödel, Kurt
2.212;
3.84111
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von
3.3741; 6.43
Gordon, Cyrus
3.3421
Grabbe, L.
3.4452;
3.44521; 3.44522; 3.44523
Graf, K. H.
4.631
Gramsci, Antonio
2.5512
Greenleaf, Simon
3.291; 3.461
Greenstein, D. I.
3.3743
Griffiths, A. Phillips 5.412
Gundry, Robert
3.36
Habermas, Gary
3.21; 3.32
Hahn, H. F.
4.63113
Hailsham, Lord
3.2921
Haley, J. W.
4.653
Hall, Jerome
3.1261
“Hamlet”
6.531
Hammerstein, Oscar, II 6.822
Hanson, N. R.
2.3532;
2.8211
Harris, J. W.
2.5531
Harrison, R. K.
4.281
Harnack, Adolf von
3.277
Hartnack, Justus
2.38231
Hartshorne, Charles
1.21; 1.221;
2.412
Heaton-Armstrong, A. 3.6232
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
2.2231; 2.2232; 2.2233;
2.431; 5.22; 5.221; 5.2214;
5.222; 5.224; 5.225; 5.226;
5.23; 5.231; 5.251; 5.261;
5.262; 5.62211; 5.263;
5.264
Heidegger, Martin
2.5; 5.2213
Heim, Roger
2.32143
Heisenberg, Werner
2.3221
Hempel, C. G.
2.992
Heraclitus
2.411
Herod Antipas
3.44522
208
Herod
3.44521;
3.44522
Herodias
3.44522;
3.344523
Herodotus
3.1171
Hitler, Adolf
2.3721
Hobbes, Thomas
5.61; 6.821
Holford, G. P.
3.276
Homer
3.3422
Hooykaas, R.
2.71; 4.761
Hordern, William
2.38322;
2.383223
Horney, Karen
5.93
Hort,
3.25631
Hubble
3.86271
[“Hubble radius”]
Hubert
6.3221
Hughes, Howard
3.29111
Hume, David
3.671; 3.672;
3.6721; 3.6722; 3.6723;
3.673; 3.6733; 3.674;
3.6741
Hunter, C.
2.712
Huxley, Thomas
3.86111
Imbert, Jean
3.4451;
3.4522
Iqbal
Irenaeus
Isaac
Isaiah
1.221
3.2732
3.843
4.632;
4.6322
Jacob
3.843
Jahweh
2.384131
Jaki, Stanley
3.8631
James, William
1.227; 1.912
Jaubert, A.
4.6541
Jefferson, Thomas
3.381;
3.8545; 5.312
Jeffery, A.
3.2561
Jerome, St.
4.652
Jesus Christ
See Index of Subjects
Jiva, Sri
1.221
Joachim of Floris
2.14
Job
4.281
Indexes
John, St.
3.251; 3.262;
3.2731; 3.27311; 3.2732;
3.275; 3.2751; 3.3741;
3.393; 3.532; 3.534;
4.8502; 5.8222
John the Baptist
3.8211
Johnson, David
3.67331
Johnson, P.
4.731
Johnson, Samuel
6.43
Jonah
4.273;
4.6411
Joseph
3.344431
Josephus
3.211; 4.28
Joshua
4.76; 4.763
Jung, Carl Gustav
1.914; 5.93;
6.32; 6.321; 6.322; 6.3221;
6.323; 6.324; 6.324; 6.34
Justinian
5.331;
5.3312
Kahn, Ghengis
3.1111;
5.542; 5.62212
Kaiser, W.
4.291
Kant, Immanuel
1.911; 2.181;
2.3212; 3.842; 5.21; 5.211;
5.212; 5.213; 5.261; 5.263;
5.5; 5.51; 5.52; 5.53; 5.55;
5.57; 5.6; 5.61; 5.614; 5.62;
5.911
Keith, A.
4.122
Kennedy, Duncan
2.55
Kenyon, Sir Frederick 3.2521;
3.254
Kerouac, Jack
5.271
Khoury, J.
3.8626
Kierkegaard, Søren
2.173; 5.221;
5.2211; 5.2213; 5.2214;
5.992
Kitchen, K.
4.291
Kluckhohn
6.412
Klug, Eugene F. A.
4.9332
Koch, Kurt
6.542
Koestler, Arthur
2.17344
Krause, K. C. F.
2.412
Kuenen, Abraham
4.631
Kuhn, Thomas
2.7; 2.73
Küng, Hans
4.6241
Lacan, Jacques
2.6; 5.93;
6.31
Lane, W.
3.344523
Latourette, Kenneth S. 5.993
Lavey, Anton
2.143
Lazerowitz, Morris
2.221
Lecky, W. E. H.
3.56131
Legge, James
1.84141
Lehmann, Paul
5.43
Leibniz, G. W.
6.361; 6.85
Lenin, V. I.
3.784; 5.422
Lenski, R. C.
3.344523
Lenzen, Victor F.
2.32201
Lessing, G.
3.118
Lévi-Strauss, Claude 6.41
Lévy-Bruhl, Lucien
6.3221
Lewis, C. S.
1.83; 1.832;
3.3424; 3.6723; 3.8543;
4.851; 6.43; 6.94
Lincoln, Abraham
2.9331;
5.292
Linnemann, E.
3.362
Locke, John
5.61; 2.721
Lockhart, J. G.
6.43
Loftus, Elizabeth.
3.6232
Luedemann, Gerd
3.3722;
3.633; 3.634
Lukács, Georg
3.784
Luke, St.
3.262;
3.2732; 3.2771; 3.344431;
3.382; 3.4442; 3.44521;
3.44522; 3.552; 4.7111
Luther, Martin
2.671;
3.25631; 4.2821; 4.33211;
4.332111; 4.85021; 4.922;
4.923; 4.9411; 4.972;
5.863; 5.99; 6.631; 6.641;
6.68
MacGregor, G. H. C. 3.3731
Mackenzie, Lord
3.12513
Madden, E. H.
2.35221
Magdelene, Mary
3.631
Maier, G.
3.362
Malcolm, Norman
3.8412;
3.932; 6.8322; 6.951;
Introduction
209
Mark, St.
3.2731;
3.2732; 3.2771; 3.344523;
3.4442; 3.551; 4.331
Marshall, Chief Justice John
4.9324
Martin, Walter
3.14313
Marx , Karl
1.61; 1.914;
2.17344; 2.5512; 4.9412;
5.23; 5.231; 5.232; 5.2322;
5.233; 5.234; 5.2343;
5.261; 5.262; 5.263; 5.264;
5.422; 5.961; 5.9611
Mary
3.344431;
3.69
Masur, Gerhard
5.251
Mathuranatha
2.2221
Matthew, St.
3.2732;
3.2771; 3.344431; 3.382;
3.4442; 3.512; 4.7111
Mauss
6.3221
McClosky, Herbert
3.44; 3.446
McCord, James
2.14
McCullagh, C. B.
3.115
McGrew, Timothy
3.11821
McNeile, A. H.
3.3423
Mendeleev, D. I.
3.67321
Mendelsohn, S.
3.12514
Mendelssohn, Felix
6.98
Mengele, Joseph
6.95
Menuge, Angus
3.86111
Michelangelo
5.2231
Michelson, A. A.
2.7311
Midgley, M.
2.712
Mill, John S.
2.35212
Mixter, R.
4.732
Modigliani
3.2921
Moench
6.412
Moltmann, Jürgen
2.463
Montgomery, J. W.
4.753
Moore, G.E.
5.36; 5.41
“Moore, Mrs. Marmaduke”
2.17345
Morgenstern,
4.63112
Morley, E. W.
2.7311
Moroni, the angel
3.14313
Morris, H.
4.731; 4.752
Morton, A.Q.
3.3731
Moses
4.281;
210
4.2911; 4.631
Muhummed
2.122;
3.14312
Müller, Max
1.11
Munchhausen, Baron 2.812
Murdoch
6.412
Nagel, Ernest
3.121
Napoleon
2.9331;
3.6721
Nash, Ogden
2.17345
Nee, Watchman
4.9312
Nehemiah
4.281
Nero
3.2732
Nestle, Eberhard
3.256
Newman, R. C.
4.121; 4.732
Newton, Isaac
2.7311;
3.6731; 3.6741
Nicolai, Philip
6.98
Nielsen, Kai
2.1715
Nietzsche, Friedrich 5.313
Noah
4.272; 4.75
North, Gary
5.8453
Nostradamus
4.112
Okamoto, Kanei
Olbers, H. W. M.
Olson, Elder
Origen
Orwell, George
Osborne, Grant
Osborne, John
Otto, Rudolf
2.9724
Ovrut, B.
1.5112
3.8631
4.9331
6.951
1.71
3.36
2.671
1.931;
3.8626
Paine, Thomas
4.653; 5.312
Paley, William
3.84212
Papias
3.2731
Parton, Craig
3.6721
Pascal, Blaise
3.96
Paterculus, Valleius
3.351
Paul, St.
2.384131;
3.2732; 3.2771; 3.2772;
3.3731; 3.553; 3.5533;
3.611; 3.624; 3.6251; 4.4;
4.41; 4.42; 4.43; 4.44;
4.9353; 5.8222
Indexes
Pauli, Wolfgang
2.963
Payne, J. Barton
4.12
Peirce, Charles S.
2.3522;
2.353; 2.3531
Perelman, Chaïm
3.125
Peter , St.
2.384131;
3.262; 3.2731; 3.2732;
3.4446; 4.331; 4.332121;
4.411; 4.43
Philip
3.344523;
3.532
Phillips, J. B.
3.4447
Pieper, F.
4.64121
Pilate, Pontius
2.0; 3.44531
Pitcher, George
2.38411;
2.3842
Pittenger, Norman
2.412
Plantinga, Alvin
3.11821;
4.8501
Plato
1.221;
2.38411; 2.45; 3.1181;
3.93; 4.622; 5.41; 5.91;
5.912; 6.43
Pliny the Younger
3.211;
3.5541
Plotinus
1.224
Polanyi, Michael
2.7; 2.72;
2.721; 2.722
Polkinghorne, J.
3.86422;
4.8543
Polycarp
3.2732
Popper, Karl
2.341; 2.92;
2.923; 2.9231; 2.9952;
3.86441
Presley, Elvis
3.912
Preus, Robert
2.38412
Pusey, E. B.
4.6321
Quenstedt, J. A.
6.6711
Quine, W. van Orman 6.9611
Quirinius
3.44521
Radhakrishnan
Ramsey, Ian
Ramsey, F. P.
Ramsey, Sir William
4.1223
1.221
2.342; 2.376;
2.38431
3.44521;
Rawls, John
5.613; 5.614
Rees, Martin
Reese
Rembrandt
Rheticus
Robinson, G. L.
5.61; 5.611;
3.8642
1.21
5.2231
4.761
4.281
Robinson, J. A. T.
3.27311;
3.2751
Rose, H. J.
3.34221
Ross, J.J.
2.3211
Rousseau, Jean Jacques 5.1421; 5.61;
5.912; 5.921
Royce, Josiah
1.225
Rushdoony, R.
5.8453
Russell, Bertrand
2.212;
2.2232; 2.3821; 2.3822;
Introduction
Ryle, Gilbert
2.1833
Rymar
3.34221
Salome
3.344523
Sanders, C.
3.24
Sartre, Jean-Paul
2.511;
2.9622; 5.2213
Satan
2.141;
3.4432; 4.252; 4.811;
6.421; 6.513
Saul
2.384131
Sayers, Dorothy
3.642
Schelling, F. W. J. von 1.221
Schiaparelli, G. V.
2.32212;
2.531
Schleiermacher, Friedrich
1.913
Schlick, Moritz
2.996
Schmidt, A.J.
5.9931
Schoenberg, Ronald
3.44; 3.446
Schonfield, Hugh
3.6222
Schwartz, D.
3.44522
Schweitzer, Albert
3.56; 3.561
Scott, Sir Walter
6.43
Shakespeare
3.2551;
3.86411; 5.12; 6.531
Sherlock, Thomas
3.67651
Sherwin-White, A.N. 3.351;
3.44521
211
Sidgwick, H.
5.41
Simon
2.384131
Sisyphus
6.57
Smart, Ninian
1.12; 1.1201
Smith, G. A.
2.383221;
5.22141; Introduction
Smith, Joseph
3.14313
Sobel, J. H.
3.84111
Socinus
1.226
Socrates
2.35231;
3.931; 5.1; 6.43
Sokal, A.
2.54
Solotareff, G.
4.85011
Solzhenitsyn, Alexander
5.23431
Sophroniscus
2.35231
Sparks
1.84133
Sparrow-Simpson, W. J.
6.99
Spengler, Oswald
5.24; 5.242;
5.262; 5.263
Spiegel, D.
3.63411
Spinoza, Benedict
1.225
Sraffa, Piero
2.38333
Sri Jiva
See Jiva, Sri
Stainer, Sir John
6.99
Stalin
5.23431
Standen, Anthony
2.712
Stauffer, Ethelbert
3.44521
Steinhardt, P.
3.8626
Stith Thompson
6.411
Strack, H. L.
3.78511
Strauss
3.6223
Strawson, P.F.
2.38431;
2.384311
Stump, Joseph
6.681
Suetonius
3.351
Swinburne, Richard
3.873
Tacitus
Tamura, Yoshiro
Taylor, H. O.
Taylor, Vincent
Ten Boom, Corrie
Tertullian
2.17201
Thiede, Carsten
212
3.211; 3.351
1.84134
4.133
3.344523
5.861
2.172;
3.253
Thomas
3.533; 3.534;
3.62302; 3.633; 3.6331
Thurber, James
2.531
Tillich, Paul
1.2; 1.92;
1.922; 2.153; 2.16; 2.1622;
2.19; 2.9726
Toepel, Friedrich
3.1221
Tolkien, J. R. R.
1.832; 6.44
Toulmin, Stephen
2.34; 2.9231;
3.1263
Toynbee, Arnold
1.97; 5.25;
5.251; 5.261; 5.263
Tresmontant, Claude 3.85411
Turok, N.
3.8626
Twining, W.
4.93201
Unger, Roberto
Urquhart, J.
Ussher, James
Uthman, the caliph
2.55
4.121
4.71
3.2561
Van Gulik, Robert
Van Wylen, Gordon J.
Venturini, K. H. G.
Villey, Michel
Virgil
Voltaire
2.9721
3.8628
3.6222
5.313
3.2521
3.8645; 6.85
Walther, C. F. W.
6.661; 6.662;
6.663
Washington, George 3.411
Watkins, J. W. N.
3.1111
Weems, Mason
3.411
Weil, Simone
1.832
Wellhausen, Julius
4.631
Wells, G. A.
3.212
Wells, H. G.
2.981
Wells, J.
4.731
Wenham, John
3.4444
Wesley, John
5.9922
Westcott, B. F.
3.25631
Whately, Richard
3.6721
Whitehead, Alfred N. 1.23; 2.212;
2.35234; 2.412;
Introduction
Whitney, Eli
5.2331
Wieman, Henry N.
1.229
Wilder, Thornton
6.8321
Wilder-Smith, A. E.
4.731
Wiley, John
3.8628
Williams, C. S. C.
3.3423
Williams v North Carolina
2.3731
Williamson, T.
3.971
Wisdom, John
2.98; 3.69
Wittgenstein, Ludwig 1.8321;
2.23261; 2.241; 2.341;
2.376; 2.382; 2.3821;
2.3822; 2.3823; 2.3831;
2.38311; 2.3832; 2.38321;
2.38322; 2.38333; 2.3842;
2.56; 2.9511; 2.996;
3.1181; 3.66423; 3.93;
3.932; 4.801; 5.2214;
5.22141; 5.7; 5.71; 5.72;
5.73; 5.8; 6.581; 6.6723;
6.8322; 6.951; Introduction
Wolff, Robert Paul
5.613
Wright, G. Ernest
4.25121
Wright, G. H. von
2.35253;
2.38231
Wright, N. T.
3.36
Wybo, J.
3.12513
Yamauchi, E.
3.34211;
3.4453; 4.291
Zahn, Theodor
213
3.27311
INDEX OF SUBJECTS*
Users of this Index are reminded that the subtopics of any given topic develop
that topic, e.g., 3.62 is developed by 3.621-3.629, hierarchically. In general,
the Index of Subjects serves as a substitute for cross-references in the text.
Abduction
See
Retroduction
Abortion
5.83
Absurdity, as truth-test 2.172
Activism, as truth-test 2.13
Adam
4.841
Adam and Eve
4.271,
4.7112, 4.72, 4.81, 4.84,
5.8652
African famines
4.831
Agnosticism
3.8651, 3.92
Ahriman
1.41
Ahura Mazda
1.41
Alchemy
6.322
Alcoholics Anonymous 6.762
Allos
3.743
Almah
4.12241
Analytical assertions 2.932
Analytical assertions See also
Certainty
Analytical philosophy movement
2.931
Analytical philosophy movement
See also Vienna Circle
Anarchy
5.841
Ancient documents rule3.291
Anglicanism
2.162,
4.9241
Anthropology
5.13121
Anthropophagy
See
Cannibalism
Anthropos
4.841
Antichrist
2.14
Anti-supernatural bias 3.119,
3.2761, 3.37, 3.38, 3.71,
4.6321
* Prepared by the Author.
214
Apocalyptic literature of Old
Testament
3.511
Apocrypha, Old Testament
4.282
Apocryphal gospels
3.274
Apostate churches
6.753-6.754
Apostles’ Creed
4.9243
Apostolic authority and apostolicity
4.3
Apostolic succession? 4.421
Aramaic, as spoken by Jesus:
relation to Greek texts
3.7431
Ararat, Mount
4.753
Archaeology: confirms reliability
of New Testament 3.4453
Archetypes
6.322, 6.34,
6.35, 6.36, 6.4
Ark, Noah’s
See Flood,
Noahic
Arminianism
4.8502
Art, primary
6.44
Assensus
6.6711
Astronomy
2.942, 3.113
Asylum
5.83
Athanasian Creed
4.9243
Atheism
3.8, 4.801
Atheists as myth-makers
3.8521
Atonement
1.914, 6.72
Atonement
See also
Jesus: atoning death
Augsburg Confession 6.75
Augustine: on biblical inerrancy
4.332111
Authority, as truth-test 2.12, 2.131
Indexes
Authority: in world’s religions
1.7
Autism
2.541
Autocracy
5.843
Autographs, original 3.255
Autosuggestionism
5.2251
Babel, Tower of
6.58
Bach, J. S.
5.2322, 6.97
Bahaism
1.97
Balance scale model for dealin
with alleged biblical
errors 4.655
Ballads, English
3.3423
Baptism
3.523,
3.741,3.745, 4.9242, 6.76
Bayes’s Theorem
3.873
Becoming, not Being 2.4
Being Itself, God as
2.9726
Being, not Becoming 2.45
Bhagavad-Gita
4.963
Bible
See also
Infallibility; Inerrancy;
Transcendence
Bible societies
4.25211
Bible, early chapters of: historicity
4.7
Bible: Authorised Version
4.2821, 4.71
Bible: birds of the
4.961
Bible: chronology
4.71
Bible: clarity of
4.92, 4.97,
5.853
Bible: essential source of absolute
ethical and human rights
principles 5.8
Bible: genealogies
3.44431,
4.711
Bible: interprets itself 4.93
Bible: Jesus the centre and entire
content of 4.97
Bible: Luther’s translation
4.2821
Bible: needed to clarify and
supplement the natural law
5.3
Bible: only answer to the naturalistic
fallacy 5.36
Bible: open canon?
4.421
Bible: perspicuity of
See Bible: clarity of
Bible: phenomenal language,
use of 4.76
Bible: proven to be inerrant,
perspicuous divine
revelation 4
Bible: unity of Old and New
Testaments 4.64
Bible: Vulgata
4.2822
Biblical “contradictions” and
“errors” See
Contradictions, alleged, in
Bible
Biblical criticism
See Higher
criticism; Textual (lower)
criticism
Bibliographical test of documentary
reliability 3.25, 3.31
Big Bang
3.8625
Biochemical systems, irreducibly
complex
3.8643
Birds of the Bible
4.961
Bishops: can be mistaken
4.7113
Black & White (computer game)
3.7622
Black Muslims
2.1312
Bladder control, ethics by
5.433
Blasphemy
3.512,
3.5511
Brahma
2.9722
Brain, human: does not explain the
mind 3.8644
Buddhism
1.24. 1.41,
1.51, 1.61, 1.84131, 2.122
Cabala
1.224
Caesar, Tiberius
3.351
Calvinism
5.8453,
6.752
Calvinism: and problem of evil
4.8501, 4.8502
Canals, Martian
2.32212,
2.531
Cannibalism
5.131
215
Canon, New Testament
See Bible; New Testament
Canon, Old Testament See Bible;
Old Testament
Carton, Sidney
4.893
Categorical imperative See
Imperative, categorical
Category mistake
2.1833,
2.9322
Catullus
3.2531
Certainty, analytic and absolute
3.123
Certainty, analytic and absolute:
nattainable in synthetic
realm of fact 3.1234
Certainty, moral
See Doubt,
beyond reasonable
Challenge and response5.25
Changed life
See
Sanctification
Chaotic dynamics
3.86422,
4.8543
Charity
5.9931
Cheap grace
See Grace,
cheap
Cheese, toasted
2.1811
Chester Beatty papyri See Papyri
Chinese folk religion 1.42
Choosing Christianity to investigate:
proof of bias? 3.14
Christ, Jesus
See Jesus
Christ, little, to one’s
neighbour 5.99
Christian Science (Church of Christ,
Scientist) 2.32121, 2.35233,
2.9727
Christian truth, proclamation of:
unavoidable 6.76; 7
Christianity, case for: not circular
reasoning 3.23, 5.29
Christianity: its ethical and socia
accomplishments 5.993
Christianity: its truth and how to
prove it 3.15, 6.2
Christus victor
6.6722
Chronology, biblical See Bible:
chronology
216
Church government: no single form
mandated by Scripture
5.844
Church, early Christian: asserted
Jesus’ Deity 3.55
Church: ecclesiology 6.741, 6.756.78
Church: foundation of 4.332121
Church: not an automatic source of
correct ethical decisions
5.43
Churches, Christian
4.924
Circular reasoning: Hume’s
argument against miracles
3.671
Circular reasoning: not employed
in historical argument for
resurrection 5.29
Circular reasoning: not employed
when Christians use New
Testament documents to
establish facts of Jesus’ life
3.23
Cisterns, plastered
3.281
Civil government: no single for
mandated by Scripture
5.844
Civil rights
5.83
Civilisations
5.25
Claims: not equivalent to proof
2.996, 3.141
Classless society
5.23, 5.264
Codex Sinaiticus
3.253
Codex Vaticanus
3.253
Coherence theory of truth
2.383222, 3.1221
Commandments, Ten
4.2411, 4.962, 5.821
Commission, Great
3.523, 3.741
Common sense
2.11
Commonwealth, Cromwell’s
5.84531
Community: not an automatic
source of correct ethical
decisions 5.43
Comparative religion(s)
1.851, 6.3221
Indexes
Complexity, specified
See Specified complexity
Computer “god-games"3.7622
Computer-assisted treatment of
New Testament
materials 3.373
Computers
3.771
Conflicts, ethical
5.86
Confucianism
1.42, 1.8414
Conjunctio oppositorum
1.914, 2.2221, 6.323
Conscience
5.35, 5.85
Consensus gentium
2.35231,
5.341
Consequences of sin: moral
significance 4.88
Consistency, systematic
See Systematic consistency
Construction of documents
See Hermeneutics, legal
Constructs, explanatory
See Gestalts, conceptual
Contextual ethics 2.13, 5.43
Contingency argument for God’s
existence See God:
contingency argument
Contract theories (political)
5.61
Contradiction, law of 2.21, 2.231,
2.2321
Contradiction, law of: and dialectic
logic 2.431
Contradiction, law of: and process
philosophy 2.442
Contradiction, logical: nature of
3.392, 3.4445, 3.641
Contradictions, alleged, in Bible
3.39, 3.444, 3.64, 4.65
Contradictions: presumption against
4.9321
Correspondence theory of truth
2.38
Correspondence theory of truth:
assumptions of 2.3852,
2.3853
Correspondence theory of truth: held
by classical philosophers
and by biblical writers
2.3841
justified by necessity
2.38311, 2.384
Correspondence theory of truth: legal
method committed to it
3.122
objections met 2.3833,
2.3834, 2.385
Così fan tutti
4.651
Cosmological theories 4.733
Cotton gin
5.2331
Creatio continua
3.8623
Creation and fall of mankind: the
beginning of history 5.283
Creation: account in Genesis
4.732
Creation: date of
4.71
Credo quia absurdum 2.172
Cretans: as liars
2.3231
Cricket, Jiminy
5.35
Crimes, war
See Nuremberg trials
Criminality
5.9613
Critical Legal Studies movement
2.55
Cross-examination, as check on
witness accuracy 3.45,
3.461, 4.136
Crucial experiments
2.731
Crucifixion, date of
4.654
Curate’s egg
3.361,
3.3831
Cyclical view of history
1.61, 5.24, 5.283
Day: meaning of biblical term
4.732
Dead Sea scrolls
3.14311,
4.6322, 4.6541
Death: existential significance of
3.763
217
Death: nature and laws of
3.67322, 3.676, 4.74, 6.5,
6.93
Death-of-God
2.223, 5.313
Decision-making in religion
3.9, 6.99
Deduction
2.351,
2.3531
Deduction: justified by necessity
2.3525
Definition, descriptive and denotative
3.822
Deism
1.71, 2.26,
3.381, 3.8545; 3.86451;
5.312
Deism
See also
Enlightenment
Delphic oracle
4.111
Deluge, universal
See Flood,
Noahic
Democracy 5.845
Denominations, Christian
4.924
Denotative theory of meaning
2.3832
Design, intelligent
3.864
Design, intelligent: a legitimate
educational topic in
schools 3.865
Destabilisation
2.5512,
2.5531
Determinism
3.86422,
4.854, 6.33
Determinism
See also Evil,
problem of; Predestination
Deutero-Isaiah
See Isaiah, Book of
Devil
See Satan
Dialectic logic
See Logic,
dialectic
Diaspora
3.452412
Didactic use of the law 6.681
Dinosaurs
4.75211
Disbelief, suspension of
4.97
Disciples of Jesus: psychologically
unbalanced? 3.663, 3.6662,
3.674
218
Discipline, church
6.753-6.754
Discrimination, unjust 5.83
Ditch, Lessing’s
3.118
Divination, not interpretation
4.9325
Divine names
See Names,
divine
Divine names
See also
Ugaritic scholarship
Divine, Father
2.122
Documentary authenticity: criteria
for showing 3.24
Documentary criticism See Higher
criticism
Donisthorpe, Wordsworth
5.622
Doubt, benefit of
3.12513
Doubt, benefit of
See als
Proof, burden of Doubt,
beyond reasonable 3.123,
3.1262, 3.665, 3.97
Dragons
4.9351
Dreams
2.61, 6.531
Dualism
1.1201, 1.31
Due process
5.83
Dying declaration
3.764
Dying god
1.832
Eastern Religions
1.31, 1.71,
1.8413, 1.914, 2.9728
Ecclesiolae in ecclesiis 6.78
Ecclesiology
See Church
Eclecticism 1.97
Ecumenical Creeds
4.9243
Ecumenical religion
1.97
Education
See also
Literacy
Education, progressive 5.9
Education, public and universal
5.83, 5.9931
Egyptian writing systems in Moses’
day 4.2911
Einsteinian physics
See Relativity, Einsteinian
Eis
6.671
Elder John = Apostle John
3.27311
Elders, twenty-four
4.34
Indexes
Elenchtico-pedagogical use of the
law 6.681
Elohim
See Names,
divine Elves 6.44
Emanationism
1.224
Empirical method
2.3, 3.67511
Empirical method and certainty
2.343
Empirical method: as linguistic
proposal 2.992
Empirical method: heuristic in
nature 2.331
Empirical method: its assumptions
2.32
Empty tomb
3.321
End justifying the means
3.784, 5.21, 5.264, 5.42,
5.9611
Enlightenment project 5.22141
Enlightenment, 18th century
5.5
Enlightenment, 18th century
See also Deism
Entropy
2.464, 3.862
Environmental catastrophes
4.831
Episcopal Church
4.9241
Epistemology
2; 6.2
Epistemology-begging the question
2.1
Equality
5.83, 5.9931
Errare humanum est? 4.62
Eschatology, biblical 4.87, 4.8833,
4.961, 5.283, 5.37, 5.8453,
6.42, 6.6601, 6.9
Eschatology, liberal
2.463
Eskimo languages
3.74311
Ether
2.7311
Ethical principles presupposed by
philosophers of history
5.264
Ethics
5
Ethics
See also
Intuitionism; Morality
Ethics, contextual
See Contextual ethics
Ethics, secular: inadequacy of
5.275
Ethics, situation
See Situation ethics
Ethics: diversity
1.8, 5.131
Ethics: diversity
See also
Relativism, ethical Ethics:
in world’s religions 1.8
Ethnography
6.412
Euangelion
5.971
Eucatastrophe
6.44
Eucharist
See Lord’s
Supper
Euclidean geometry
2.9321
European Court of Human Rights
5.8452
Evangelicals, liberal 3.782, 4.601,
4.64121
Evangelicals, liberal See also
Liberals, religious
Evidence, circumstantial
3.12511
Evidence, hearsay
3.12511
Evidence, preponderance of
3.1232
Evidence, relevant
3.1231
Evil genius (Descartes) 2.3231, 3.752
Evil, problem of
4.8
Evil: as illusion
2.9727
Evil: consequences
4.88
Evil: in world’s religions
1.4
Evil: not taking it seriously
5.213
Evils, lesser of
5.865
Evils, natural
4.83
Evolutionary theory
2.464, 2.712,
3.56, 3.8542, 3.8643,
3.8651, 4.6312, 4.73, 5.313
Existence, meaning of: found in
biblical revelation alone 5
Existentialism and existential
thinking 2.9622, 3.763,
3.922, 5.221, 5.4231, 6.361
Existentialism: and the
Hermeneutical Circle 2.5,
4.94
Experience, religious, as truth-test
2.15
219
Experiments, laboratory: not required
to verify synthetic
assertions 2.94, 3.113
Explaining the world: why bother?
3.852
External test of documentary
reliability 3.27
Extra-biblical material in biblical
interpretation 4.93, 4.94,
4.97
Extrasensory phenomena
4.113
Extraterrestrials
See Space
creatures
Extrinsic evidence in the construction
of documents 4.93
Eye banks
5.4242
Eyewitness testimony See
Testimony
Flood, Noahic
4.272, 4.75,
6.412
Folklore
6.4
Forgiveness
3.8412
Formality
See Logic
and pure formality
Form-criticism
See Higher
criticism
Fountain, town
4.923
Four Noble Truths
1.84131
Freewill
See
Determinism; Evil, problem
of; Predestination
Freewill and providence
See Theodicy
French, the
5.3412
Fulfillment, personal 6
Fundamentalism
4.2521,
4.961, 6.6601
Facts: self-interpreting 2.37, 3.112
Facts: to be respected 2.56
Facts: when in tension with logic 2.8,
3.67511, 4.85023
Fagin
5.3511
Fairy tales
6.44, 6.901
Faith: as defined by classical
dogmaticians 6.6711
Faith: as gift of God
4.8502
Faith: as truth-test?
2.17
Faking of documents 3.292, 3.321
Fall of man
See Sin
Falsifiability
2.92, 3.611
Family life
5.83
Famine
4.831
Faust, Goethe’s
3.3741
Federal Rules of Evidence
3.1231
Fellowship
6.13, 6.7
Fideism
2.17, 5.2214
Fiducia
6.6711
Finite God (Brightman)
2.461, 4.802
Finitum capax infiniti 3.118
Fitting the facts
2.34
Flagellum, bacterial
3.8643
Flew-Wisdom parable 2.98, 3.69
Gardener (first Easter and FlewWisdom parable) 3.69
Gegraptai
4.251
Genealogies of Jesus See Bible:
genealogies
Genealogies, biblical See Bible:
genealogies
Generic rights
5.5, 5.6
Germanism
5.22
Geschichte vs. Historie 2.9725
Gestalts, conceptual
2.34, 3.11
Gestalts, conceptual: genuinely
empirical 2.36
Gestalts, conceptual: how formed
2.35
Ghosts
2.9953
Gloria, the
6.44
Gnostic gospels
3.274, 4.963
Gnosticism
3.2752,
4.9311, 4.963
God, death of
See
Death-of-God
God, the Unknown
5.37
God: classical proofs of his existence
3.842, 5.52
God: contingency argument for his
existence 3.85, 3.862,
3.8644
220
Indexes
God: creating him in our own image
3.78531
God: desires everyone possible to be
saved 6.4411
God: evidence for his existence
3.8
God: evidence for his existence
See also Ontological
argument
God: his characteristics from natural
theology 3.854
God: his love the basis of freewill
4.851
God: his moral character 3.8543
God: his revelation the only answer
to the naturalistic fallacy
5.36
God: in world’s religions
1.2
God: must he tell the truth?
3.75
God: omnipotent?
See Finite
god
God: omniscient?
See
Omniscience of God
God: personal?
3.8542
God: philosophical conceptions of
1.2, 3.8224
God: rational?
3.8541
God: sovereignty of
4.8835
God: who created him? 3.853
God-games, computer 3.7622
Goethe, Eckermann’s 6.43
Golden rule (biblical) 1.831,
Golden rule (biblical) See also
Imperative, categorical
Golden rule (in legal hermeneutics)
4.9321
Gospel and law: critical distinction
between 6.63-6.65, 6.752
Gospel harmonisation 3.4443
Gospel story: as historical fulfilment
of myths of the world 6.4
Gospel, biblical: defined
6.751
Gospels, Synoptic, and Acts of the
Apostles: early dating of
3.277
Gospels, Synoptic: individual
purposes in writing 3.4442
Grace, cheap
6.651
Graphai, hai
4.431
Gratitude for redemption: provides
highest ethical motivation
5.8222, 5.9, 6.73
Greek definite article: when needed
and when not 3.534
Greek philosophical ideas: imposed
on New Testament
teaching? 3.746
Guidance, divine
See Theodicy
Gulags
5.23431
Gurus
3.6, 3.66422
Hairs of the head
6.81
Hamlet
4.9331
Hearsay
3.12511,
3.764
Heaven and hell
3.7723, 3.95,
3.96, 4.8531, 4.85021, 6.84,
6.9
Hebrews, Book of: canonical
4.44
Heilsgeschichte
See Salvation
Hell and heaven
See Heaven
and hell
Heresy
6.753-6.754
Hermeneutical Circle 2.5, 4.94
Hermeneutics, biblical See also
Bible: phenomenal
language
Hermeneutics, biblical 4.9
Hermeneutics, legal
3.3831,
3.542, 4.93, 4.94
Hermeneutics, literary 3.542, 4.93,
4.94
Herod Agrippa
3.44522
Herod Philip
3.44523
Herodias
3.44523
Heteros
3.743
Hiding place ethical dilemma
5.86
Hierarchical ethics
5.86
High Priest, Jesus before
3.512
221
Higher criticism, New Testament and
in general 3.782, 4.22, 4.25,
4.27, 4.6311
Higher criticism, Old Testament
4.63
Higher criticism: its anti-miraculous
bias 3.2762
Higher criticism: its inherently
unscholarly nature 3.3,
3.445, 3.63
Hinduism
1.511, 1.61,
2.9722
Historians must set aside biases
3.111, 5.2
Historians, Graeco-Roman
3.351
Historians, Graeco-Roman
See also Cyclical view of
history
Historians: distinguished from
existentialists 3.1111
Historical claims verifiable
2.941
Historical events unique 3.1192
Historical evidence: can be employed
without circularity 5.29
Historical evidence: demonstrates
Christian truth claims 3
Historical explanation: and
psychoanalysis 2.67
Historical facticity: not dependent on
consequences or whether
fact is important 3.117
Historical investigation of
particulars: possible without
comprehensive
understanding of history
5.29
Historical knowledge: synthetic in
nature and probabilistic
3.1182
Historical method: must regard facts
as self-interpreting 2.372
Historical method: no ground for
ruling out the miraculous
3.119, 3.2761, 3.675, 3.676
Historical method: parallels scientific
method 3.1
222
History vs. theology? 4.612, 4.613
History, goal of: in opinions of
philosophers of history
5.261, 5.27
History, goal of: in world’s religions
1.6
History, philosophy of 5.11, 5.12, 5.2
History: able to embrace absolutes
3.118
History: and historical novels 2.533,
3.115
Holiness movements 5.9922
Holocaust
4.891
Holy Spirit
3.743, 4.31,
5.9821
Homeric poems
3.3422
Homo
4.841
Honesty: assumed in empirical
investigations 2.323
Hope, theology of (Moltmann)
2.463
Hubble radius
3.86271
Human rights
See also
Transcendence
Human rights
5.14, 5.313,
5.6, 5.7, 5.83, 5.845, 5.85,
5.9611
Humanism
3.54, 3.56,
5.313, 5.44, 6.921
Humanity: common psychological
life and needs of 6.36
Hypercommercialism 5.24
Hyperphysics (Chardin)
2.464
Hypnosis, mass
3.634
I-am sayings of Jesus
Idealism, Hegelian
Idealism, Platonic
4.622
Idolatry
Ignorance, veil of
Iguanas
Il y a une fois . . .
Iliad, Homer’s
Illusion: evil as?
Illusion: God as?
3.53
5.2
3.1181,
6.24
5.61
4.75211
6.424
3.3422
2.9727
2.66
Indexes
Imagination, categories of the
6.3221
Immortality, genetic
6.921
Imperative, categorical See also
Golden rule (biblical)
Imperative, categorical 5.5, 5.6
Incarnation
2.492, 2.59,
3.1183, 3.785, 3.822, 4.613,
4.624, 4.891, 6.44, 6.96
Inconsistency, happy, of liberal
theologians 4.64121
Indeterminacy principle (Heisenberg)
2.3221
Individuation
6.324
Induction
2.3531,
3.821
Induction: and process philosophy
2.44
Induction: as linguistic proposal
2.992
Induction: cannot be assimilated to
deduction 2.35213
Induction: cannot be justified
pragmatically 2.3522
Induction: how justified?
2.352
Induction: not true by definition
2.3524
Inductivism, Baconian 2.721
Inerrancy
See also
Augustine; Bible;
Infallibility; Luther
Inerrancy of Scripture 4.6
Inert gases
3.67321
Infallibility
See also
Augustine; Bible;
Inerrancy; Luther
Infallibility
4.6241
Infinite regress
2.9931, 3.85
Information theory, God as source of
3.85411
Inklings
6.781
Innocents, slaughter of 4.1225
Insanity and refusal to be logical
2.23241
Instinct
5.242
Instrumentalism
See
Pragmatism
Intelligent design
See Design,
intelligent
Interest, declarations against
3.12512
Internal test of documentary
reliability 3.26
Interpretation
See
Hermeneutics
Intuition
2.11, 2.13
Intuitionism
5.41
Isaiah, Book of
3.14311,
4.632
Islam
1.51, 1.71,
1.821, 1.8412, 2.122,
2.9723, 3.1431, 3.54,
3.86412
Islam: lack of miraculous evidence to
prove claims 3.14312
Islam: no Quranic textual variants?
3.256
Jedem das Seine
5.331
Jefferson Bible
3.381
Jehovah
See Names,
divine
Jehovah’s Witnesses 3.534
J-E-P-D theory
4.631
Jerusalem, fall of in A.D. 70
3.275, 3.276, 3.371,
3.45241
Jesus Seminar
3.3722
Jesus, decision concerning:
consequences of 3.95, 6.99
Jesus: view of New Testament
4.3
Jesus: “I am” sayings See I am
sayings
Jesus: “silent years” in India?
3.66422
Jesus: all things created through him
4.7331, 4.82, 6.82
Jesus: as divine Messiah
3.511, 3.56, 4.1
Jesus: as divine Saviour
3.52, 3.552, 3.73, 5.252,
6.42
223
Jesus: as divine Saviour
See also Salvation:
Christian understanding of
Jesus: ascension into
heaven 3.676523, 3.67653,
3.741
Jesus: atoning death 3.782, 6.72
Jesus: baptism
3.745
Jesus: birth of
6.44
Jesus: birth of
See also
Virgin Birth of Jesus
Jesus: centre and entire content of
Scripture 4.97
Jesus: centre of history 5.283
Jesus: certainly died on the cross
3.622
Jesus: claims to Deity vindicated by
his resurrection 3.72, 3.76
Jesus: claims to Deity vindicated by
prophecy 4.122, 4.13. 4.15
Jesus: decision concerning him
required by the evidence
3.9, 6.99
Jesus: Deity asserted by early
Christian church 3.55
Jesus: Deity asserted by New
Testament writers 3.55
Jesus: existence as historical figure
3.212
Jesus: fallible during his earthly
ministry? 3.78, 4.624,
4.6412
Jesus: foundation of church
4.332121
Jesus: fully man as well as fully God
3.54
Jesus: God incarnate by his own
claim 3.5
Jesus: if God, then whatever he says
must be accepted as true
3.77, 4.2
Jesus: married?
3.66422
Jesus: mentally ill?
3.561, 3.57
Jesus: miracles performed during his
ministry 3.71, 3.8211
Jesus: only a siimple moral teacher?
3.57
224
Jesus: pre-existence
3.531,
4.7331
Jesus: presents Trinitarian view of
God 3.74
Jesus: prevaricator? 3.5613, 3.57,
3.6224, 3.75, 3.784, 3.785,
4.136
Jesus: promises eternal life to those
who believe in him 3.765
Jesus: real presence in Eucharist
4.9353
Jesus: resurrection from the dead
See Resurrection of Jesus
Jesus: second coming 3.553, 3.783,
4.272, 5.37 6.42
Jesus: teaches way of salvation
3.772, 5.252
Jesus: trial of
3.4451,
3.512
Jesus: view of Old Testament
3.782, 4.2, 4.7331
Jesus: view of the Bible in general
4.5, 4.611, 4.6231, 4.655,
4.656
Jewish law
See Law,
Jewish
Jewish literature of intertestamental
period 3.78511
Jewish references to Jesus and the
early church 3.21
Jewish religious leaders at time of
Christ 3.452, 3.65, 3.662,
3.6662, 4.136121, 4.261
Jews at time of Christ 6.43
Jews: gospel preached first to
3.4521
Johannine writings, authorship of
3.3741
John, Gospel of
3.273, 3.275
Johnson, Boswell’s
6.43
Jonah and the “whale" 4.273,
4.6411
Joshua’s long day
4.76
Jot
4.241
Joy
6.44
Jubilees-Qumran calendar
4.6541
Indexes
Judaism
1.71, 1.8412,
3.1431
Judaism: monotheistic 3.555
Jurisprudence
2.55
Jurisprudence
See also
Transcendence
Justice, Two Principles of (Rawls)
5.61
Justinian Code
5.331
K source
4.63112
Karma
1.41
Kenosis theory
3.78, 4.611
Kind, after its
4.73211
Knowledge, secular and religious: an
inseparable unity 4.612,
4.613
Koran
See Islam
Ku Klux Klan
2.1312
Kuhn thesis
2.7
Lamb, marriage supper of the 6.42
Language 6.58
Language games
2.3832,
2.3834, 4.881
Languages, hierarchy of
2.3822
Lapsus linguae
2.61
Laryngitis
5.2251
Law and gospel: critical distinction
between 6.63-6.65, 6.752
Law, Biblical
5.82
Law, Civil and Common
5.9931
Law, Jewish
3.12514
Law, Lozi
3.12511
Law, Natural
See Natural
law
Law, Persian
3.12512
Law, Roman
3.12513,
4.6241
Law: meaning of term in Judaism
4.241
Law: no human person is above it
5.83
Law: three uses; always accuses;
saves no-one 6.5-6.6
Leap of faith
2.17343
Lectionary readings
3.253
Legal evidence: benefit of the doubt
3.261
Legal evidence: demonstrates
Legal method
3.12
Legal method: capable of
demonstrating religious
truth 3.126
Legal method: committed to
correspondence theory of
truth 3.122
Legal method: consistency across
legal systems 3.1251
Legal method: highly regarded by
philosophers 3.126
Legal method: importance of
3.125
Legal method: must regard facts as
self-interpreting 2.373
Legal method: parallels historical
method 3.121
Legal method: parallels scientific
method 3.1
Legal philosophy
See
Jurisprudence
Legal scholarship concerning witness
testimony 3.42
Legal scholarship: and higher
criticism 3.35
Legal scholarship: supports
trustworthiness of New
Testament documents 3.29
Leisure time
5.83
Lesser of evils
See Evils,
lesser of
Lex semper accusat
6.683
Liberals, religious
4.963, 6.7636.764
Liberals, religious
See also
Evangelicals, liberal
Libido
6.321
Life cycles in history 5.24
Life relation in historical scholarship
3.1111
Life, right to
5.83
225
Light, nature of
See Photons
Lincoln, death of
2.9331,
5.292
Literacy
5.9931
Literacy
See also
Education
Literal rule and literal interpretation
4.93
Literary style and vocabulary
unreliable as determinants
of authorship 3.374
Liturgy
6.77
Logic and insanity
2.23241
Logic and mathematics
See Mathematics and logic
Logic and metaphysics 2.2233
Logic and necessity
2.232
Logic and other worlds 2.2326
Logic and pure formality
2.24, 2.932, 5.251, 5.61
Logic as the scaffolding of the world
2.241, 2.83
Logic, Aristotelian
2.221
Logic, deductive and formal
2.2, 2.3, 2.351
Logic, dialectic
2.223, 2.431,
5.22, 5.23, 5.251
Logic, Hegelian
See Logic,
dialectic
Logic, Indian
2.2221
Logic, non-Western
2.222
Logic, symbolic vs. classical
2.221
Logic: and certainty 3.1234
Logic: has no plural 2.22
Logic: not established by revelation
2.231
Logic: not the source of religious
truths 2.26
Logic: when in tension with facts
See Facts: when in tension
with logic
Logic: why accept it? 2.23
Logical positivism
2.3822
Longevity of Old Testament
patriarchs 4.74
Lord’s Supper
4.9353
226
Love and freewill
See Evil,
problem of
Love letters and scholarly
monographs 3.3742
Love, eternal: requires Trinitarian
view of God 3.747
Love, God’s: the basis of freewill
See God: his love
Lozi law
See Law,
Lozi
LSD
See
Psychedelic drugs
Lumbago, cures for
5.2214
Luther: on biblical canonicity,
inerrancy, perspicuity, and
meaning 4.33211, 4.922,
4.923, 4.972
Luther: on freewill
4.85021
Luther: on proper distinction between
law and gospel
6.63-6.64
Lying
5.86
Lying “of the devil” (Jesus)
3.4432
Lying witnesses
3.44, 3.45
Magisterial interpretation
4.934
Maieutic theory
5.9
Majority, tyranny of the
5.4242
Man: “is what he eats"?
5.232
Martians
See Space
creatures
Marxism
1.61, 1.914,
2.17344, 2.223, 2.5512,
2.553, 5.422, 5.961
Marxism
See also
Materialism; Reductionism,
materialistic Marxism: and
Winnie the Pooh See Winnie
the Pooh
Materialism
5.23, 6.321
Mathematics and logic 2.212, 2.25,
2.932, 3.1234
Maya
1.61
Indexes
McCloskey-Schoenberg test of
perjured testimony 3.44
Meaningfulness, psychological
2.951
Meaningfulness, sociological
2.951
Meaningless assertions 2.95, 3.61,
3.752, 4.61111, 5.222
Means, motive, and opportunity
3.452
Memory, reliable, of New Testament
witnesses to Jesus 3.28
Mendeleev’s table
See Periodic table
Messiah
See Jesus
Messiahs, false
3.6
Metaphors, biblical
4.935
Michelson-Morley experiment
2.7311
Micro-organisms
4.741
Mind: inexplicable as brainphenomenon 3.8644
Mining, coal
5.931
Ministerial interpretation
4.934
Miracles
3.119, 3.67,
3.76
Miracles
See also
Anti-supernatural bias
Miracles: and statistics 3.6723
Miracles: Hume’s argument against
3.67
Miracles: question of definition
3.675, 3.676
Mischief rule
4.9321
Modernists
See Liberals,
religious
Monads
6.361
Monkeys & typewriters
3.86111
Moose Lodge
6.762
Moral certainty
See Doubt,
beyond reeasonable
Moralism
4.962
Morality
See also
Ethics
Morality: requires consequences
4.88
Mormonism
1.71, 2.122,
3.1431, 3.29111
Mortido
6.321
Moses
4.243,
4.2911, 4.631
Motifs
6.322, 6.4
Motive, means, and opportunity
3.452
Multiple-source truth-tests
2.16
Mysterium tremendum 1.931
Mysticism
1.224
Mythology
6.3221, 6.4
Mythopoeic, the
6.3, 6.4
Myths rather than history in New
Testament narratives?
3.4422
Names, divine
4.631
Napoleon
3.6721
Narnian Chronicles
3.3424, 6.94
National Socialism
2.1311
Natural justice
See Due
process
Natural law (jurisprudence)
5.3, 5.85
Natural law (physics): absolutistic
view of 3.673, 3.6741,
3.86422
Natural law (physics): absolutistic
view of See also
Uniformity of nature
Natural meaning of a text
4.93
Natural theology
3.87
Naturalistic fallacy
2.152, 5.36
Nature, human: false views of
1.3, 5.234, 5.263, 5.274
Nazism
2.1311
Ne rien vouloir savoir 6.311
Neo-Hegelianism
2.9621
Neo-Marxism
See Marxism
Neopolitan gesture, Sraffa’s
2.38333
Neo-Thomists
3.811
Neronian persecution 3.2732
227
New Age
3.66422
New England Primer 1.421
New Hermeneutic
2.1716, 4.94
New Shape Roman Catholicism
2.472
New Testament documents: early
dating of 3.275
New Testament documents: only
reliable source for Jesus’
life 3.263, 3.44501, 3.6311
New Testament documents:
reliability supported by
legal scholarship 3.29
New Testament documents: their
historical soundness 3.2,
3.621
New Testament: canon of 4.3321
New Testament: confirmed by
archaeology 3.4453
New Testament: interiorises Old
Testament law 5.822
New Testament: Jesus view of
See Jesus: view of New
Testament
New Testament: textual variants
3.256
Newtonian physics
See Natural
law (physics): absolutistic
view of Nicene Creed
4.9243
Noahic Flood
See Flood,
Noahic
Nonsensical assertions See
Meaningless assertions
Northumbrians, conversion of
3.941
Nose, wax
4.4911
Notitia
6.6711
Nous
4.9312
Nuremberg trials
5.141
Old Testament
See also
Commandments, Ten Old
Testament patriarchs saved
looking forward to Christ
6.441
Old Testament: archaeological
support for 4.29
Old Testament: books comprising
canon at time of Christ 4.28
Old Testament: civil and ceremonial
law 5.821
Old Testament: Jesus view of
See Jesus: view of Old
Testament
Old Testament: provable as
revelation only by way of
New Testament 3.14311,
4.29, 4.34
Olympic game analogy for theology
2.383223
Omega Point (Chardin) 2.464
Omnipotence, divine See Finite
god
Omniscience, God’s 2.462, 4.86
Once upon a time . . . 6.424
One and the Many
1.121
One right answer thesis 2.377
Ontological argument for God’s
existence 3.84
Ontology
2.19
Open society
2.9952,
5.845
Open universe
3.671,
3.86422, 4.8543
Openness theology
2.462
Opportunity, means, and motive
3.452
Ordinary language philosophy
2.3524, 2.3832, 2.38331
Organic view of history 5.24
Orphans
5.9931
Ouroboros
2.38542
Obedience: not a valid mark of the
church 6.752
Occultism
6.542
Odyssey
3.3422
Olbers’ Paradox
3.863
Pagan references to Jesus and the
early church 3.21
Paidagogos
6.682
Palaeobotany
2.942, 3.113
228
2.9728,
Indexes
Panentheism
2.412
Pantheism
Papias of Hieropolis
Papyri
3.44523
Parables, biblical
Paradigms, scientific
Paradise
Paranoia
1.221, 1.227,
1.225, 2.412
3.2731
3.2521,
4.935
2.7
6.341
2.811,
2.9231
Parol evidence rule
4.9322
Parthenos
4.12241
Past and present experience:
ontologically the same
3.116, 3.1182
Patriarchs, Old Testament
4.291, 4.74, 6.441
Paul, death of
3.2771
Pauline writings: canonicity and
authority 4.4
Pauline writings: treated to computer
analysis 3.373
Pearl of great price
5.81
Peccari, non posse
4.871
Pedagogical use of the law
6.681
Pentateuch
4.2411,
4.281, 4.2911, 4.631
Perfection, moral
5.992
Periodic table of the elements
3.67321
Persian law
See Law,
Persian
Person, the human: in world’s
religions 1.3
Person, the human: in world’s
religions See also Nature,
human
Personhood: requires denotative
definition 3.8223
Petrine theory
4.332121
Pharisees
3.4522.
5.8221
Phenomenology vs. theology?
1.1201
Phenomenology, religious
6.3, 6.4
Philosophy of history See History,
philosophy of
Philosophy of law
See
Jurisprudence
Philosophy, traditional: antiempirical tendencies of
3.6712, 5.214
Philosophy: as disease to be cured by
analytical verifiability 2.96
Philosophy: legal method as benefit
to 3.126
Photons
2.821,
3.67511, 3.7461
Physical law
See Natural
law (physics)
Physics, Newtonian
2.7311
Pilate inscription
3.44531
Pilgrim, Bunyan’s
6.56
Poetry, biblical
4.935
Political theory, biblical
5.84
Political use of the law 6.681
Polycarp of Smyrna
3.2732
Polychrome Bible
3.3721
Polytheism
6.43
Pooh, Winnie the
4.9412, 4.95
Possibility
3.123
Possibility
See also
Speculation
Post hoc, propter hoc 1.111
Postmodernism
5.13131,
6.361
Postmodernism: and the
Hermeneutical Circle 2.5,
4.94
Power corrupts
5.2311
Pragmatism
2.3522,
2.3523, 3.1221
Prayer
3.86422
Predestination
See also
Determinism
Predestination: and problem of evil
4.8501
Predestination: double and single
4.8502
Predicament, human 5.27
229
Predicament, human See also
Transcendence
Preponderance of evidence
3.1232, 3.1262
Presence, real
4.9353
Present experience: continually
becomes past experience
3.116
Pre-Socratic philosophy
2.45
Presuppositionalism 2.18
Presuppositionalism: in science
2.7
Presuppositions: all arguments begin
with 2.43
Primary sources
3.22, 3.46,
3.5, 3.56, 3.621
Primary sources
See also
Testimony, eyewitness
Primordial thoughts
6.3221
Probability: Bayes’s Theorem
3.873
Probability: characteristic of
historical knowledge
3.1182, 3.123, 3.664
Probability: characteristic of legal
knowledge 3.123, 3.461,
3.664
Probability: characteristic of
scientific knowledge 3.123
Process philosophy
2.223, 2.4
Process philosophy: inherently selfcontradictory 2.443
Process theology
2.223, 2.4
Process theology: and evil
2.49
Process theology: and redemption
2.492
Process theology: biblical opposition
to 2.48
Proclamation of Christian truth:
unavoidable 6.76; 7
Procrustean beds
2.56, 2.95,
3.112
Product rule
4.13
Progress as ideology 2.712, 3.56,
4.6312, 4.731, 5.2
230
Proof, burden of, as to accuracy of a
text 3.261, 3.391, 3.394
Proof, burden of, as to accuracy of a
witness 3.431, 3.4422
Proof, standard of
3.12511,
3.664, 3.676
Proof: not established by mere claims
2.996
Proof-texting
4.2521
Prophecy
2.462, 3.276,
3.371, 3.45221, 3.551, 3.68,
4.1, 4.6321
Prophecy, fulfilled: stressed in
Matthew’s Gospel 3.4442
Prospective personal agents
(Gewirth) 5.62
Providence, divine
See Theodicy
Psychedelic drugs and the real world
2.3214
Psychical investigators 2.9953
Psychoanalysis
See also
Psychology, depth
Psychoanalysis: and historical
explanation 2.67
Psychoanalysis: and objective truth
2.6
Psychoanalysis: and the unconscious
5.93
Psychoanalysis: and Winnie the Pooh
See Winnie the Pooh
Psychological determinism
See Determinism
Psychological miracles vs biological
miracles 3.674
Psychology, depth
6.3, 6.4
Psychosomatic illness 4.83
Public knowledge of facts of Jesus’
life 3.4525, 3.625
Pure Land
1.511
Puritans
5.84531
Purpose in life
6.14, 6.8
Quantum physics
Quirinius’ census
Qur’an
2.821
3.44521
See Islam
Racial equality / racism5.83, 5.854
Radon compounds
3.67321
Indexes
Rape, metaphysical
4.852
Rationalism, ethical
5.5, 5.6, 5.91
Real presence
4.9353
Reason, Age of
5.312
Reasoning from the unknown to the
known: fallacy of so doing
3.74312
Recall, total, by Apostles
4.3, 4.4
Reconstructionism
5.8453
Red Cross
5.9931
Redaction-criticism
See Higher
criticism
Redemption
6.42
Redemption: essential for ethics and
human rights 5.9
Redemption: necessary for ethics and
human rights 5.572
Redemption: provides strongest
ethical motivation 5.8222,
5.9, 6.73
Reductionism, economic
5.233
Reductionism, materialistic
6.321
Reductionism, materialistic
See also Marxism
Reductionism, psychological
2.661
Reformers, liberal social
5.961, 6.763-6.764
Reformers, Protestant
4.2822, 4.3321
Reformers, Protestant, and
Aristotelian logic 2.2211
Reincarnation
2.9728
Relativism, ethical
5.131,
5.2213, 5.87
Relativism, ethical
See also
Ethics: diversity
Relativity, Einsteinian 2.3221,
2.7311, 3.6731, 3.6741
Relevant evidence
3.1231
Religion, comparative See
Comparative religion(s)
Religion, higher, brought to birth
5.25
Religions of the world 1
Religions of the world: incompatible
& mutually contradictory
3.142, 3.732
Religions of the world: inherent
problems 3.8224
Religious claims of the meaningless
sort: analytical verifiability
as corrective 2.97, 3.61,
3.732
Religious claims of the non-synthetic
sort: testing precluded
3.143, 3.61
Renaissance, Italian 5.2331
Repeatability: not required to verify
synthetic assertions 2.94,
3.113
Repentance, daily 5.992
Représentations collectives
6.3221
Reputation
5.83
Res ipsa loquitur
3.666
Resurrection narratives: not
contradictory 3.4444
Resurrection of Jesus 3.67322,
5.37, 6.44
Resurrection of Jesus See also
Empty tomb
Resurrection of Jesus: and Jonah
4.273
Resurrection of Jesus: and thus
eternal life 6.92
Resurrection of Jesus: capable of
proof 3.6, 3.873, 5.2214
Resurrection of Jesus: consequences
3.7
Resurrection of Jesus: Flew’s
argument against 3.674
Resurrection of Jesus: historical
argument for not circular
5.29
Resurrection of Jesus: how to define?
3.675, 3.676
Resurrection of Jesus: mechanism of
3.675, 3.676
Resurrection of Jesus: missing body
problem 3.65, 3.674
Resurrection of Jesus: physical
3.623, 3.676523
231
Resurrection of Jesus: vindicates his
claims to Deity 3.72, 3.76
Retroduction
2.353
Revelation
See Bible;
Jesus
Revolution, American 4.9241,
5.312
Revolution, French
5.312
Right to life
See Life,
right to
Rights, civil
See Civil
rights
Rights, human
See Human
rights
Rights, inalienable
See Human
rights
Ring, fellowship of the 6.781;
Dedication page
Road, on the
5.271
Rock on which church is founded
4.332121
Roman Catholicism
2.122,
2.35233, 2.472, 4.3321,
6.44111
Roman Catholicism
See also
Apostolic succession?;
Bible: Vulgata; Trent,
Council of; Vatican Council
Roman law
See Law,
Roman
Romanticism: and Winnie the Pooh
See Winnie the Pooh
Rotary Club
6.762
Sacraments
See also
Baptism, Lord’s Supper
Sacraments
6.661
Sacrifice
6.72
Sacrifice
See also
Atonement; Jesus: atoning
death
Sadducees
3.4522
Sado-masochism
5.541
Salome
3.44523
Salvation of those who have never
heard of Christ? 6.4411
232
Salvation, Christian understanding of
3.772, 4.8832, 4.89, 4.95,
4.96
Salvation, Christian understanding of
See also Jesus: as divine
Saviour
Salvation, Christian: untouched by
Old Testament errors? 4.64
Salvation: in world’s religions
1.5
Salvation: only through personal
belief-relationship with
Christ 6.4411, 6.67
Salvation: second chance?
6.4411
Samaritan, Good
4.9352
Sanctification
3.7724,
4.93121, 5.9
Sankara
1.225
Santa Claus
4.85011
Satan
2.14, 4.252,
4.811, 5.941, 6.42, 6.5,
6.951
Scepticism
2.383221,
2.55, 5.2214, 6.44
Scepticism, historical 3.115, 3.116,
5.2214
Scepticism, moral
5.613
Scepticism, testimonial
3.412
Science, religion of
2.71
Science: the product of metaphysics?
2.7
Scientific evidence: demonstrates
Scientific method
See
Empirical method
Scientific method: no ground for
ruling out the miraculous
3.119
Scientific method: not the same as
scientism 2.711
Scientific method: parallels legal
method 2.722
Scientism
2.71
Scott, Lockhart’s
6.43
Sects, religious
2.9955
Secularism: its bigotry 3.865
Indexes
Self-serving declarations
3.12512
Septuagint
4.12241
Sermon on the Mount 3.382,
3.56121, 4.962, 5.8221
Seventy weeks prophecy of
Messiah’s coming 4.1221
Shakespeare
3.2551
Show trials
2.553
Sidon
4.121
Simul justus et peccator
5.992
Sin, forgiven, by Jesus 3.51
Sin: as cause of death 4.742
Sin: consequences
4.88, 6.23,
6.832
Sin: irrational
4.8822
Sin: original and universal
4.81, 4.84, 4.882, 4.9244,
5.213, 5.2214, 5.311, 5.432,
5.44, 5.5-5.6, 5.8-5.9, 6.36.5
Sin: perpetual possibility of a fall?
4.87
Situation ethics
5.42, 5.865
Slavery
5.83, 5.9931
Sleeping Beauty
6.42
Slums
5.9612
Social reformers
See
Reformers
Societas Christiana
6.781
Sociological surveys 2.9322
Sociologist’s fallacy
See Naturalistic fallacy
Socrates, Plato’s
6.43
Solipsism
2.3213,
2.532
Son of man: meaning of expression
3.511
Sources, primary
See Primary
sources
Soviet “new men"
5.23431
Space creatures
3.6642,
5.2342
Sparrow’s flight
3.941
Sparrows
6.81
Specified complexity 3.864
Speculation
3.6225,
3.6311, 3.664
Speculation
See also
Higher criticism
Spirit, Third Age of the 2.14
Sri-Vaishnava
1.511
Statistical sample, Adam as
4.841
Statistics: and history 5.2722
Statistics: and miracles
See Miracles
Statistics: and prophecy
4.13, 4.14
Stoicism
5.37
Story, telling one’s own
2.51, 2.532, 2.552, 2.57
Subjectivism
5.42, 5.8541
Subjectivity, radical: incoherent
2.383221
Subjectivity: truth as 5.221
Subject-object distinction,
essentiality of the 2.322
Sun standing still
See Joshua’s
long day
Superstructure and base
5.2321
Suspension of disbelief See
Disbelief, suspension of
Swoon theories
3.622
Syncretism
1.97
Synthetic assertions
2.933,
3.1182, 3.61
Synthetic assertions
See also
Probability, Possibility
Synthetic assertions: verification
does not require laboratory
experiments or repeatability
2.94
Systematic consistency (Brightman)
2.1834, 2.38432
Systematic theology 2.18211,
2.1834
Tabula rasa
2.721
Talaq
1.8211
Tanganyika, banana crop in
4.921
Tao
1.83
233
Taoism
1.42, 2.9721
Tarka-Samgraha
2.2221
Tautology
2.2321,
2.241, 2.25, 2.932, 3.1234
Taxonomy, Aristotelian
2.22111
Temple, cleansing of 3.393
Terrorism
See Twin
Towers
Testimonial accuracy of New
Testament: not impugned by
external evidence 3.445
Testimony
See also
Witnesses
Testimony in general: scepticism not
warranted 3.412
Testimony of New Testament writers
to Jesus: sound and
accurate 3.4, 3.621, 3.665,
4.136
Testimony, eyewitness: claimed by
New Testament writers
3.262
Testimony: collusive 3.4441
Testimony: legal scholarship
concerning 3.42
Testimony: mistaken identifications
3.6233
Testimony: quality not quantity
3.12513
Testimony: tests of perjured
3.44, 3.45
Testimony: witness innocent until
roven guilty 3.43
Texts, integrated, to be viewed as a
whole 3.3831
Textual (lower) criticism
3.251, 3.33, 4.29
Textus Receptus
3.25631
Theism
See God
Theists, “classical"
3.811
Theocracy
5.8453
Theodicy
4.8823, 6.83
Theology vs. history? 4.612, 4.613
Theology vs. phenomenology?
1.1201
Theonomism
See
Reconstructionism
234
Theories as nets to catch the world
2.341
Theories as shoes to fit the foot of the
world 2.342, 2.376
Thermodynamics, Second Law of
3.862
Thieves, honour among 5.131
Third use of the law
6.681
Three Character Classic
1.421
Tiberius Caesar
3.351
Tittle
4.241
Tolerance principle, linguistic
2.3823
Tomato, Holy
3.86412
Torah
3.14311
Torture
5.83
Totalitarianism
1.71, 5.842
Transcendence
3.8644, 5.27,
6.42
Transcendence: necessary for
absolute moral judgments
4.801, 5
Transcendence: necessary for human
rights 5.14, 5.6, 5.7, 5.8, 5.9
jurisprudence 5.1421
personal fulfillment 6
philosophy of history 5.121,
5.2
Transcendence: necessary for valid
revelation claims 3.73, 6.2
Transcendence: no use without
revelation 5.282
Transformation, symbols of 6.324
Trent, Council of
4.2822
Trinity
3.74, 4.6241
Truth as subjectivity 5.221
Truth-tests, religious 2
Tuning, fine, of the universe
3.8642
Turkey
5.8452
Twin Towers horror
2.971,
4.88221
Tyre
4.121
Indexes
Uebermensch
5.622
3.3421
See also
Divine names
Unconscious, collective
6.322
Unconscious, the
See also
Psychoanalysis
Unconscious, the: and objective truth
2.6
Unicorns
4.9351
Uniformity of experience (Hume)
3.671
Uniformity of nature 2.3521, 3.673,
3.6741
Uniformity of nature See also
Natural law (physics):
absolutistic view of
Unitarianism
3.54, 3.747
Universalisability / universalisation
See Imperative, categorical
Universe, open
See Open
universe
Universe, oscillating and cyclical
3.8626
Universe: finely tuned 3.8642
Universe: finite, not infinite
3.8622, 3.8627, 3.863
Universes, succession of
3.8624
Uthman, 3rd caliph
3.2561
Utilitarianism
5.424
Utilitarianism
See also
Pragmatism
Value judgments of philosophers of
history 5.262
Values
See also
Ethics
Values: created by one’s own
decisions? 2.51
Vatican Council 1870 4.2822
Verifiability principle 2.9
Verifiability principle: as linguistic
proposal 2.992
Verifiability principle: defined
2.93
Verifiability principle: justified by
necessity 2.91, 2.994
Verifiability principle: not circular or
meaningless 2.99
Verifiability principle: not itself
subject to verification 2.993
Verification, eschatological
2.4631
Verification: Christianity willingly
subject to 3.61
Verification: like support required for
a building 6.9611
Vienna Circle
2.3821
Vienna Circle
See also
Analytical philosophy
movement
Virgin Birth of Jesus 3.38, 4.1224,
4.132
Wager, Pascal’s
3.96
War crimes
See
Nuremberg trials
Washington, George 3.411
Watchmaker: blind? 3.861
Waterloo, battle of
2.9331,
2.941, 3.1172, 5.292
Wave-particle theory of light
See Photons
Wellhausen theory
See J-E-P-D
theory
Weltgeist
5.22
Westcott and Hort text 3.25631
Wholly Other, God as 2.9724
Wienerschnitzel
5.2322
Wife beating
4.61311
Wish-fulfilment
6.96
Withering away of state and law 5.23
Witnesses, accuracy of See
Testimony
Witnesses, hostle, as functional
equivalent of crossexamination 3.452, 3.63413
Wittgenstein II (of the Philosophical
Investigations)2.3832;
Introduction
Women
5.9931
Women at the tomb Easter morning
3.321, 3.631
235
Women in 1st century Judaism
3.321
Word of God, as truth-test
2.174
Work, right to
5.83
World Trade Centre
See Twin
Towers
World, existence of the: necessary
assumption 2.321, 2.3852,
2.3853
Worlds, best of all possible
6.85
Xenon compounds
3.67321
Yahweh
See Names,
divine
Yin and Yang
1.914
Zoroastrianism
Zurich bankers
1.41
6.322
236

Tractatus Logico-Theologicus

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